Hunting in the Moonlight
by Tashuub
Summary: Go out, meet new people, kill them, cut off a finger and bring it back for a reward. Such is the life of a bounty hunter. The oddities of the wasteland will never cease, even when beings from another world start appearing and making the Mojave a reluctant home.
1. Bounty Eileen

**I do not own Fallout New Vegas, Ragnarok Online, or the plot of New Vegas Bounties as they all belong to Bethesda Softworks, GRAVITY Co., and someguy2000 respectively. I simply use the settings with the characters to create a story of how I perceive someguy2000's mod would be done if it was semi-real.**

* * *

Chapter 1

Bounty Eileen

"You ready for another job?" A man covering his face said behind his desk. The man is wearing goggles and a face bandana that covers the lower half of his face, adorns a cowboy hat on top and is clothed in a brown duster with leather, fingerless gloves.

Another man in the single room building stands on the other side of the desk nods. Wearing the same duster with rolled up sleeves, light brown pants, dark brown boots, a tan cowboy hat with metal rings circling the center, a dark green scarf around his neck, and has red tinted sunglasses covering his brown eyes. The man standing accompanied his nod with a "yes".

Steven, the man sitting behind his desk and typewriter, nods. "That's what I like to hear. Our client is offering 1000 caps for this next target. After hearing about her misdeeds, I understood why."

Steven grabs a nearby sheet of paper with information of the upcoming target and hands it to the other man across the desk. "The bounty is on a Fiend named Eileen. She's a vicious twat with a reputation for castrating male captives and consuming their flesh. Suffice to say her activities are detrimental to troop morale. The payout is big on this one, so bury that sick bitch and head back."

The other man now presented as a bounty hunter, nods and turns to the door. Picking up a dark colored leather rucksack and takes his modified Marksman Carbine off his back to keep it at the ready. Opening the door to exit out, the morning light filtering into the small building welcomed the bounty hunter to a new day to traverse the wasteland.

The bounty hunter closes the door behind him and stares out into the distance, seeing the remains of a large building with rollercoaster tracks not far away, past ruined buildings and an overpass as a bridge to the town of Primm. Briefly taking off his hat to get an itch on his scalp, reveals his red colored hair to the morning shine. Putting the hat back into place, he lowers his scarf to grant access to his mouth. Taking the canteen situated behind his right kidney, he brings it to his mouth, takes a few sips of clean water to quench his thirst for the trip ahead. A rough beard can be seen before he pushes the scarf back up to cover his mouth and nose.

He brings out the paper he received from his boss Steven to read.

**Property of Randall & Associates**  
Target: Eileen  
Race: Caucasian  
Allegiance/Faction: Fiends  
Location: Fiend Territory, near Vault 3

Notes: Eileen is suspected to have captured, tortured, and murdered at least a dozen NCR soldiers in the past year alone. She's skilled with a blade, and takes pleasure in mutilating the genitals of captured men. One source reports that she's made a "cock necklace" out of dicks taken from prisoners. Oh, and she eats her victims, too.

-Randall

The man finishes reading the paper, folds and stows it away in his rucksack. He pulls out a small, rectangular device with three buttons on the top left, a turn dial underneath, Geiger Counter below that and a screen covering the right side from the buttons. At the bottom left reads 'Scorp Tech Limited Edition'. He pushes the 'Data' button and brings out a map, reading the time which states 0627. He puts the device away, bringing his rifle at a lowered position, ready to bring it up in case of threats.

Turning towards the ruined outskirts of Primm, he sets off in his trip to Fiend territory. Passing by a pack of coyotes in an abandoned truck trailer, going through the remains of a picnic and playground, reaches a hill going down with a wall built into it. Calmly walking down the hill and moves past the ruined buildings and defensive positions of the local NCR troops, he walks northbound on I-15.

* * *

On his way towards Sloan, he came across two males, roughly in their twenties, wearing blue coats over light blue shirts, dark blue pants, and somewhat annoyed expressions. One was armed with a .357 Revolver and another was holding onto a stick of dynamite in his right hand with a lighter in his left. The one with the gun spots the hunter and shouts, pulling up his revolver to shoot their next perceived prey.

The bounty hunter brings up his rifle, taking aim at the stick of dynamite that has yet to be lit and fires. The stick explodes in the poor sap's hand, taking it and half his arm and front in the explosion. The revolver wielding gunman shoots wildly, the shots missing at varying distances. The hunter calmly aims at his next target and shoots two 5.56 bullets, his rifle making little to no sound, hits center mass. The last hostile goes down, gasping for air as his lungs were pierced, he slowly bleeds out, deprived of oxygen.

The hunter scans the area quickly for any other threats, after seeing none moves forward towards the corpses in an attempt to find anything useful. Seeing how one was missing the front half of his body, he searches the other corpse and finds a stick of dynamite, four rounds of .357, and a bottle of water. He grabs the water and ammo and stows them away in his rucksack, grabs the dynamite and while walking away, lights it and throws it back at the relatively intact corpse. Uncaring of the explosion that happens behind him, he carries onward to Sloan.

* * *

He arrives in Sloan at 1155, takes a small break near one of the barriers made of sandbags to eat the Honey Mesquite Pods inside his rucksack. After eating three pods, he brings his canteen up to drink the last of the water in his canteen, mentally sighing as the water goes down his throat. Reaching into his rucksack, he grabs the bottle of water he looted earlier he opens it and pours its contents into the canteen. When the last of the water drips into the canteen, he closes the canteen and puts back into its holster in his person and puts the now empty water bottle on the sandbag barrier.

The hunter stands back up and continues on his way north via I-15. Walking nearby the Quarry Junction, he hears the sounds of the residents of Sloan working further in the quarry. Moving forward, he walks while the midday sun beams down harshly on him and the landscape.

As he nears Hunter's Farm, his attention is grabbed by the sounds of gunfire at the farmhouse. As he narrows his eyes, he grabs a pair of binoculars from the left pocket of his duster and brings it up to his eyes. Looking through the binoculars, he focuses on the farmhouse seeing gouts of flame being blown. Two males in blue with NCRCF on the back are fighting against three large bipedal, purple lizards. One of the lizards drops with bullet holes covering its large head with one hole in its left eye. However the other two lizards quickly pounce on the two humans, using their overbearing weight to pin the gangers. Opening their mouths, they breathe out fire, covering the poor bastards in fire. Unfortunately, one of the men had a stick of dynamite on their waist, which became lit due to the fire and after three seconds explodes. The blast scatters the human body all over the place and concussive force shot the large lizard backwards, landing on its head and snapping the spinal column.

The hunter lowers his binoculars and stows it back into his pocket. He moves onward, pulling his rifle up to the ready position and taking aim while slowly approaching the lone survivor of the battle of five. The large lizard stands up and in its peripheral, sees an approaching figure. The lizard turns and as it gets ready to charge at its next prey, a 5.56 round enters its skull and falls over covering the burnt corpse it just got off of. The hunter scans the nearby area for other lizards, seeing none he lowers his rifle and continues walking down the road. "Damn fire geckos, making me waste ammo on them," the hunter muttered.

He heads towards the downward slope of the roads with overpasses in the distance. He gets off the road and moves alongside the barbed wire fence of an old farmhouse. He travels towards the Samson Rock Crushing Plant as a place to set up while he searches for his target. He arrives and goes up a set of stairs, setting his rucksack down he pulls out the rectangular device to check the time. "1513 huh, well better do an ammo check in case things go to shit again," the hunter said to himself. Putting the device away, he removes the magazine from his rifle and ejects the round, collecting said round and inserted it back into the magazine. He opens up his duster to reveal a black shirt and various ammo holsters, three of which he opens and removes the magazines within.

He opens up his rucksack, removes a sawed-off shotgun and a holster for it, and attaches it to his right leg. Opening up the shotgun, he sees two 12-gauge shells in the weapon and with a nod, closes the shotgun and holsters it. Pulling out a pistol with what appears to be a silencer from his waist; he sets it out in front of him and searches for the other magazines for it in the ammo pouches on his person. Removing five of them, he sets them next to the pistol. Reaching to his waist again but on the opposite side, he grabs a revolver and sets it down. Reaching into a pocket, he pulls out an ammo loader with six rounds already set inside and places it next to the revolver. Reaching inside his duster, he grasps the Stun Grenades and sets them out one by one.

He looks over the small armory of his; mentally counting up the number of rounds and grenades the semi-circle holds. "Nine magazines of 5.56 rounds fully loaded, one with only 26 rounds left. Five fully loaded magazines of .45 rounds, the magnum is loaded with six rounds and the ammo loader is full. Four stun grenades and the sawed-off is ready. As long as I don't fight a long firefight, then this will be doable." He sighs and starts loading his empty weapons and puts everything back into their holding places for quick equipping and reloading.

Looking around, he sees a pile of boulders nearby and decides to hide his rucksack underneath one of the easier to lift rocks. Descending the stairs with his rucksack half-slung, he moves one of the rocks aside and places his rucksack down. Moving the rock back to cover the sack and hide it from scavengers, he sets out to the outer perimeter of his current hideout to see the current patrols of Fiends in the distance. Giving himself adequate concealment, he brings out his binoculars to get a better look at the drugged out raiders. He mentally notes the locations and routes he witnesses of the various people with little armor and bovine skulls for headwear.

While keeping an eye out on raiders, he sees one female with a short sleeve shirt showing her midriff, brown jean shorts and a knee pad on her left knee. She was walking into a demolished building with three walls still standing although one more than the other two. Moving to get a better view of her incase she became an outlier of patrol routes; he saw her grabbing some meat from a table with a skull decorating it. He noted that the meat resembled human flesh more than other forms of meat in the wastes. Pulling out the bounty notice, he put together with the rather vague description of Eileen with the one he was currently observing. Figuring he found the target he took further notice of the surrounding area, seeing only two other fiends to east of his target and several to the far west, he quickly put into his mental plan that going in through the eastern side was more beneficial as long as he was quiet.

He set up in good concealment and waited for dusk to start arriving. When the sun was setting over the canyons to the west, he aimed with his rifle. Noting that through the scope that the two patrolling fiends were out of range due to the small target size, he crawled while prone forwards to a small pile of soil acting as small concealment and cover. He checked through his scope again and found the two within firing range. One was leaning against the wall smoking a cigarette, watching his partner walk around. He kept an eye on the two, waiting for the one that was patrolling to look away from himself and the other fiend. The moment came and he shot the smoking fiend in the neck, silencing any forms of calling for help. The hunter quickly aimed to the other fiend before he saw what became of his comrade and shot him in the back on the left side, where the heart is located.

Waiting to see if either would get back up for a few seconds, he quickly got up and crept towards the building containing his target within. Looking through an opening that was once a window, he saw his target lying on a bed mattress next to the table. He slowly and quietly moved up to her side and pulled out his silenced .45 Pistol. Positioning the barrel towards her head, he pulled the trigger and saw the bullet punch a hole through her skull and a pool of blood forming on the mattress. He holstered his pistol and quickly searched her for anything useful and found a note titled "Thanks" in her back pocket. He looked around real quick for anyone looking or heading in his direction, seeing none he mentally reads the letter.

'Violet,

You were right about applying the fire. I used your method and it worked like a charm. The NCR punk cried like a bitch from the start, and I had to cut out the tongue to keep the noise down. Later I burned his feet until he couldn't feel it, then cut off the cooked parts. I started over on the unburned flesh and it was like having a fresh captive again – the bastard squirmed so much I had to use another strap to keep him under control. After I got to his knees, I cut off his eyelids and let him sit under the sun for a couple days, giving him water to drag it out. I think it cooked his brain or something. Anyway, I don't know where you learned that trick, but it's great. Finally, I finished up in the usual fashion by cutting off his nuts and cramming them down his throat. He almost suffocated, so I put him on his stomach before letting the dogs after him. He lasted a few more hours and then went quiet. Thanks again for teaching me the ropes. We're going to make these NCR motherfuckers learn the meaning of pain!

-Eileen

P.S. You said some guy from way east taught you, right? Was his name Marko? I can't remember. He must be a bad motherfucker!'

Seeing how he has proof of identity of his recent victim before him, he reaches out for her knife and uses it to cut off her finger. Looking at the combat styled knife in his hand while absently putting the finger into a small bag, he notices the word "Emasculator" etched on the side of the blade. Shrugging, he wipes the blood off the blade using the clothes on the corpse; he places the knife into his back pocket and quickly checks the other two for anything useful. Finding a pack of cigarettes and a Flamer Pistol on one and a Plasma Repeater on the other, he grabs the cigarettes and pistol and heads back to the rock crushing plant while keeping his head down and crawling when out in the open.

After the many tense moments of crawling, he makes it back to the plant and sets himself into a sitting position on a wall facing away from the Fiend territory. Grabbing his canteen, he takes a large gulp of water. Nearly emptying his canteen, he puts it back and heads towards the spot he hid his rucksack to refill the canteen. Moving the rock covering the sack, he reaches in and grabs a bottle of water and quickly empties it into the canteen. Putting the empty water bottle back into his rucksack, he put it onto his back and looked towards the direction of travel back.

Before he sets out though, the sound of rocks tumbling down attracts his attention. Turning to another large pile of boulders and rocks, he sees one of the strangest sights he ever witnessed. A young girl with blond hair and red eyes is looking at him atop the pile. What he noticed, with a weary sigh, was that she had no form of clothing on. She was carrying a pole with a large bell attached, placed inside her hands that resembled paws from a breed of canine that were covered in fur up to her elbows. The same could be said of her feet and legs, on her chest was fur crisscrossing resembling a natural bra. Atop her head was what looked like the head of a canine with its eyes closed? He noticed a tail of sorts with a white colored tip behind her. The fur on her body was the same color as her hair.

The girl's eyes were wide as if she was not expecting anyone to be nearby. She quickly narrowed her eyes and readied her odd weapon as though she was going to attack. The hunter stared with a blank face, mentally sighing at the odd encounter, took his left hand off his rifle and simply raised it to signify he was not going to harm her.

The girl either did not recognize the gesture or ignored it jumped up with her weapon in a position to do an overhead strike. The hunter jumped and rolled to his right pulling his rifle up in a crouched position. He did not expect the impact of her weapon to cause a crater in the ground nor the small tremor that followed. Quickly collecting himself, he shouted at her, "Seize your hostile actions or I will deem you a threat and kill you as one!"

The blonde followed up with, "Shut it human! I know you had something to do with me being here!"

The bounty hunter pauses, then questions, "With you being here? I just got back here less than three minutes ago after killing three Fiends up north. Besides what the hell are you doing out here alone?"

The young girl looks at the hunter with anger in her eyes. She screams, "You will return me where I am from now!" while she readies her weapon once more.

The hunter gets his rifle up again while asking, "Where are you from exactly? No one looks anything like you do around here."

The girl calms down slightly, seeing the human before her has not yet to do anything hostile or unwanted. She straightens herself and replies to the man, "The caves outside Payon."

"Payon," the hunter repeats trying to recall any place resembling that name. Coming up with no matches, he simply asks, "What exactly is the area around Payon like cause I have not heard of such a name before."

The girl stares at the human, tensing slightly at his answer. She answers, dreading the results of her description. "Payon is a human settlement in a forest."

The hunter, hearing the word "forest" lowers his rifle and stands up. Removing his hat to scratch the side of his head, he replies sadly, "Forest? Sorry little lady but I have not heard of any forests being in one piece after the Great War burned everything. The only settlement I'm aware of that is in any form of wooded area is Jacobstown up in the mountains."

The blonde girl loses a bit of her composure and leans forward. Thoughts racing across her mind as to how she ended up in a location with someone not aware of Payon. Even more astonishing to her was that forests are practically gone here. She straightens herself back up and simply asks the human before her, "So where on Rune-Midgard am I?"

"No idea what Rune-Midgard is either little lady but you're in the Mojave Wasteland, situated in the state of Nevada in the ruins of the United States of America," the hunter informed her.

After hearing that, the odd girl froze for a few seconds before turning towards the pile of boulders and with an angry cry, smashes the closest boulder with one of her fur covered fists. She continues doing this with the various sized boulders of the pile, turning them into small rocks and dust with each frustrated cry. As the pile of boulders become smaller and smaller, tears started forming and falling from her eyes. When the pile of boulders become a pile of rocks and pebbles, she fell to her knees and started crying silently to herself, uncaring of being watched while doing so.

The hunter just stood there, absently noting that the tail was connected to her just above her rear end, watching the odd girl let out the frustration in her system. He stayed in that same spot for five minutes keeping an eye out for threats while the girl lamented. After a while, he moved towards her to see if she was alright enough to travel on her own. However, upon reaching her, he found that the girl had passed into blissful unconsciousness. Looking down on her, he mentally thought to himself, 'Should I just leave her here by herself? I got no real obligations to her. I have more bounties to get to.' He started walking away but after several steps he stopped. Taking another moment to think, he let out an audible sigh and turned back. Making sure his rifle was on its sling securely; he bent down and picked up the girl bridal style. Or he tried to as the pole and bell weapon was fairly heavy. Setting her back down, removed the weapon from the girl's grasp and took out a belt from his rucksack. Using the belt, he secured the odd weapon to his rucksack and picked her up again.

He decided to head to Goodsprings to see if he can get the girl some clothing seeing how Sloan is more of a resting location for quarry workers than an actual settlement. Traveling onto I-15 going south was quiet, especially seeing how many people and creatures prefer hunting in the daylight for easy prey. Passing Sloan and reaching the point of I-15 where another road leads to Goodsprings, the hunter was glad nothing happened on that part of the trip back.

* * *

Halfway on the road that led into Goodsprings, the girl in his arms started to stir. She opened her eyes slowly, feeling extremely fatigued, she saw the same human she conversed with earlier carrying her and saw that night had fallen completely. The look on the human's face was mostly blank, head swiveling to keep an eye out for hostiles. She noticed that one of the human's eyes was giving off a soft green color. She squirmed a little, getting the attention of her carrier. He simply looked at her and asked, "Are you able to move on your own power now?" She silently nods, as does he and simply bends slightly down to put her feet on the ground. She stands up straighter, but with slow movements showing how tired her body is. The hunter steps back a little to give her room and informs her of what his intention was.

"I was taking you to Goodsprings, mostly to get you clothes for you to wear while in this hellhole, the one of many, that we inhabit. See Doc Mitchell too incase you are injured or ill. Afterwards, it all depends on what you want to do while in the wasteland."

The fur covered blonde does not verbally agree but seeing as she has no idea where she is at the moment decides to trust the human. She decides to ask a few questions hoping anything from her home is similar to her current location. The human leads the way and answers what he could; most of the answers were usually questions on what she meant. Such answers drowned more and more of her hopes after each one were given. Her spirits were extremely low when they arrived at Goodsprings.

Looking around, the blonde noticed that the buildings were often in bad condition, looking as though they were never maintained for long periods of time. The hunter noticed the look and promptly answered, "People don't really care about looks anymore, and as long as it still functions as intended it could look like shit for all they care. Most folks share what they can with each other in their communities, including living spaces."

The hunter eyes the building with a sign saying "Goodsprings General Store". He turns to the girl and spoke softly, "That is where we can get you some clothes for you. Some form of ranged weaponry would help too as guns are pretty much the norm in wastelands. Come on, let us get Chet up and do business with the greedy bastard."

The girl looks at the human oddly before following him inside the building. She sees it empty of anyone else but her and her companion. The hunter moves behind the counter into the back room. She hears him speak, "Hey Chet wake up. I got a business transaction for you."

The sounds of another male yawning while getting up reverberate through the shop. The one named Chet reveals himself from the back room, following the bounty hunter. Chet stays behind the counter while the bounty hunter moves to the other side, pointing at the blonde girl.

"The little lady here needs clothes and equipment to help her survive the wasteland. Got anything to help fulfill those requirements?" the hunter asked.

"I'm sure I got the stuff that does, but seriously couldn't you do this when everyone else is awake?" Chet shakes his head at that end. Stopping to yawn again, he continues on, "Well, come on girly, let us take a look at the clothes I have in stock, pick what you want."

The blonde girl just timidly follows Chet to where he stores the clothes for sale. Looking through them all she goes with a pair of brown jean shorts, a red poncho, and a black wife-beater shirt. The hunter watches as she tries them on, approval in his eyes. He turns to Chet and asks, "You got any scarves like the one I'm wearing in stock? Also a pair of Biker Goggles to protect her eyes from dust?"

Chet looks at the hunter with sleepy eyes, and replies, "Yeah I do, let me grab them." Chet walks into the back room again and comes out soon after with the two items in hand. The hunter grabs the scarf and starts to tie it around the girl's neck, making sure it is on securely. Afterwards he puts the goggles on her, hanging loosely around her neck and resting on the scarf.

The bounty hunter looks at her and nods in appreciation, turns to Chet and asks, "How much for all that?"

Chet quickly tallies up the cost in his head and replies with, "120 caps for all that." The hunter nods and takes out a small pouch, opening it and dumping the contents on top the counter. Quickly counting up the required amount, separates the two stacks and dumps one back into the pouch. Pushing the other stack towards Chet, the store owner counts the caps, nodding in thanks for the business and puts the caps away.

After the deal was complete, Chet yawned once more and headed back into the back room to get more sleep. The duo of hunter and girl left the store, the hunter informed the blonde of their next course of action.

"We'll get sleep as well, see the doc in the morning and get you more supplies after that. I do not know about you but I can sleep anywhere." The hunter walks south towards an old trailer with nothing inside it. The girl looks at him and silently follows him inside the trailer. Offloading his rucksack inside, removing the girl's weapon from its improvised holster, sets it down and uses it as a pillow. Removing his rifle and setting it next to him within arm's reach, he takes off his duster and lays it on him as a blanket. Removing his hat and laying it on top of his rifle, his head lying on the rucksack turned pillow. The girl looks around in the small space, shivering a little in the cold desert air. Deciding that warmth is better, she lies next to the hunter to get as much of it as possible. The hunter looks at her and raises his left arm, gesturing that she can get closer which she accepted.

With the two underneath the duster, the body heat of the two was pleasant for the both of them and the girl fell asleep rather quickly. The bounty hunter looked at his current companion some more before looking out a nearby window to observe the stars before he too fell asleep. "What an odd day," he mumbled before closing his eyes for the night.

* * *

Morning rays of sunshine beamed down on the hunter's face waking him up. With a groan, he sits up, looks over at the girl that slept next to him. Debating whether to wake her up or give her more time to sleep. Ultimately, he decided to wait for her to wake up on her own and simply sat there waiting. As the minutes passed and the rays of sunshine moving downwards due to the sun rising upwards, the girl finally awoke rather slowly.

The blonde just rubbed her eyes to remove any dust before opening them and yawning. She took a look around herself and noticed the human she met the night before. A slight tinge of red could be seen on her face but before she could say anything, the man stood up and collected all the items he had shed before sleeping.

After adjusting the rucksack on his back, he looked at the girl and spoke, "Let's go see Doc Mitchell to make sure you got nothing detrimental to your health."

The girl just sits there staring for a few moments before nodding. Standing up herself, she followed the hunter to a house on a small hill with a fence surrounding it. Trailing behind the man as he opened the door and went inside, they searched the house for the doctor and found him eating breakfast with some Gecko Steak.

The good doctor looks up from his meal and offers a small smile at the two guests. "Well now, how can this old man help you two today?"

The hunter speaks up, "Well doc, the little lady here will need as good of a checkup you can do. Just a heads up, those 'extra' parts you see on her are actually a part of her."

Doc Mitchell looks at the blonde girl and nods, "Alright then, follow me little girl so I can look you over and make sure you're good and healthy."

The girl looks between the two men, the canine like ears on her head droop a little and follows the older, bald man into another room.

The bounty hunter watches them go into another room, silently moves into the living room and sits on the couch to wait as the other two finish. Sitting in the same position for roughly 20 minutes, the good doctor enters the living room and sits on the chair facing the couch. The blonde girl sits next to the hunter with a small blush on her face and her ears flickering a few times.

"So anything wrong with the little lady as far as you can tell," questions the duster wearing man.

"Well, despite the extra features your friend here seems to have, she is actually healthier than most folks in the wasteland. The fox appendages function as they would if they were on the actual animal." The doctor pauses for a moment to let that sinks in then continues, "With those extra appendages, I had performed a couple tests to see what else is different. Her sense of hearing and smell are increased to that of a dog's or coyote's. I would say that her physical strength is the most impressive; she is far stronger than a super mutant. If that Vit-o-matic Vigor Tester back there actually went further than 10, her strength would probably reach up to 19 or 20."

The hunter looks briefly at the girl and moves his eyes back on the doctor and asks, "What about radiation, how is she in terms of resistance to it?"

"Well due to how healthy she is, she has so little exposure to radiation that the full effects of radiation will be stronger to her than to the rest of us since we are used it on a higher level than she currently is," the older man replies.

The bounty hunter nods and thanks the doctor, handing him 50 caps for services rendered. All three stand and move about, the duo of redhead and blonde to the door and the doctor back to his kitchen.

After exiting the doctor's in Goodsprings, the male of the two speaks up, "Right then, well since your considered healthy by someone of medical expertise, what do you plan on doing now?"

The apparent fox girl looks up and after thinking about it, looks down and mumbles out, "I don't know." She looks back at him, and asks with a soft voice, "What do you think I should do now?"

Her companion scratches his cheek and replies with a contemplative look on his face, "Off the top of my head, you can stay here in Goodsprings, help the people out, or go out and find something to do. If you do the latter, I'd suggest finding someone who knows how to survive in the wasteland to give you tips and probably some experience so you have a better chance on your own."

She looks at him and asks, "What if I go with you? You obviously travel around and know more than anyone else who stays here would. Besides…" she starts to mumble, "…I don't want to be alone."

"You do realize that my lifestyle has a fairly high chance of death. I hunt people that have done horrible deeds, killed a good number of people, and get paid for such things." He squats down to look her in the eyes, "I get the feeling that you really don't see life as precious for other folks but that kind of life will eventually spread word of you around and those with bad intentions usually hear about such things very quickly. Most will want you dead; others like those from the Legion will try to get you as a slave of sorts."

She just stares resolutely back, "People usually try to kill me for looking different where I am from anyways so that is not different. If your kind of lifestyle is as dangerous as you make it sound, having someone else to watch your back would be better. You know I can protect myself, especially since I can launch you from here to the place we slept in with one punch."

The hunter stays in his position to stare back at her with a blank face. With a sigh, he breaks eye contact and stands back up straight. "Fine, but we're grabbing you some more supplies if you're going to be joining me in bounty hunting. Let us go back to Chet's and get you a ranged weapon you can use."

The two walk back to the general store and enter the building, walking up to the counter. Chet greets them, "Howdy you two, you both here for another business transaction?"

"The little lady is traveling with me, so she needs more supplies for traversing the roads. What ranged weapons you got?"

"I got several, but the only one in good working condition is the .357 Revolver. There are 18 rounds for it in stock as well, the total for both of those will be 94 caps," Chet informs the two.

The hunter agrees with the choice of weaponry and its price. He follows up with, "You have a bag of sorts to hold supplies, an empty canteen and several bottles of water?"

Chet moves to the side of his shop, pulling out ten empty bottles and an empty canteen. After setting them on the counter, he moves into the back room and grabs a small rucksack and places that next to the rest of what is being bought. "With all the items here, total will come to 304 caps."

"Right then, the bottles we can fill up later, thanks Chet." As the hunter begins pulling out the necessary amount of caps, Chet places all the items into the rucksack. Moving the small sack containing the caps across the counter, the hunter grabs the rucksack and hands it to the little girl.

The two exit the store and move towards the sign indicating the name of the town next to the road. Taking the empty canteen and filling it with water from one of his bottles, he hands it back to the girl. "Okay little lady, seeing how you're going to be traveling with me for the foreseeable future, you got any questions ya want to ask? I'll answer what I can and hope you will do the same when I ask you some."

The blonde girl looks up and thinks for a moment. "Well, what exactly is it that you do? All I can recall is that you killed 'Fiends' whatever those are."

The hunter calmly answers, "I'm a bounty hunter, if someone or something is causing problems for a group of people and issue a price for their heads then I will more than likely go after that someone or something. The problem with that, if it is someone of a faction that I killed, then news of me killing that person will reach that faction and they will see me as one to kill on sight."

"You get money from killing people? I never really liked humans anyways so I have no problems with that." She pauses after saying that when certain aspects of her life came into play. "Now that I think about it, why is it that I am calm around you? I normally kill humans on sight ever since my father died."

The hunter looks down at her while they are walking. "Well since I was born, I had a weird 'perk' is the best word, that anything that is canine in origin, whether full on or part canine, will see me as an ally. My father found out about it first. We both went out hunting and came across a pack of Nightstalkers on our return trip. They just ran around us and continued on their way to find something to eat. We found it odd at first but ultimately went back to our home. More and more scenarios similar to that kept happening throughout my childhood with various canine species. Seeing how you are technically part canine with those fox features of yours, you also see me as an ally. That is my best guess anyhow."

The smaller of the two figures on the road was silent; contemplating the explanation she was given. After a minute of following her companion, she spoke up. "Is stuff like that common or is it a rare fluke?"

"There are various oddities that folks out here end up developing. I met a fella who was capable of walking through a crowd of ghouls without any of them even noticing him there. There was a guy who kept finding the weirdest stuff in regular containers, most of the stuff that shouldn't have been able to fit inside the containers too. He bragged he once found a Fat Man, which is a large weapon, inside an ammo crate. The weapon itself is almost equal in size to two and half ammo crates long and one crate wide."

"Huh… alright another question then, when you were carrying me last night, I saw a green glow coming off one of your eyes. Is that another 'perk'?"

"Nope, that was an 'implant', basically something that was put into my body by a medical professional that either improves existing capabilities or adds something the body can use for better survival. The one you saw was a Bionic Eye, it allows me to see in different spectrums of light. It glowed green because it was set to Night Vision, greatly enhancing perceived light to me."

"…What does that mean?"

"Basically lets me see better in the dark but becomes useless in the day as all I would see is a bright light."

"Oh…sounds kind of neat."

They reach a fork in the road and continue walking south. The girl looks around, noticing how badly the roads and buildings were damaged. "Is the rest of this 'wasteland' like this?"

"Yup, a long time ago the world leaders got together and basically decided on how our race should kill itself, they chose nuclear apocalypse and covered it up by saying it was for resources. At least that is my interpretation of what happened. What you see now is the result of it and all of us are simply trying to survive now. One of the bad things is that many of the creatures in the world have become more dangerous due to the residual radiation."

"What kind of creatures are you talking about exactly?"

"Well I'll go from most dangerous to least. First are the Deathclaws, essentially the most lethal of them all. I heard rumors that they are from before the nuclear explosions that ruined our planet. They have thick hides, extremely tall compared to people being around 10 feet tall on average. Their claws cut through armor easily. The only bright side is that they have short range of sight and prefer boxed off locations in mountains or caves.

Next up would be the Cazadors, wasps that can grow to be the same size of an average adult male. They're black in color with orange wings and red eyes. They are usually the fastest creatures in the wasteland and they are deadly if they inject their venom in you. Most folks usually see them in small numbers, usually three or four outside their nests.

Following them are their rivals the Nightstalkers. Half coyote and half rattlesnake, they travel in packs and usually hunt at night. They too inject venom into prey and due to their numbers, the venom builds up quickly. I've lived near nests of Nightstalkers before and they make the sounds of both animals that comprise of them, mostly using the coyote sounds for communication between themselves and the snake for attacking prey.

Geckos are next and they are usually split into three different kinds here. Normal geckos are purple with a tint of blue in color, hunt usually by themselves and love water. The normal ones are smaller than the other two and are easier to kill. Golden geckos live near irradiated areas and when they bite someone, inject radiation in large doses. As you can tell from their name, they are usually yellow in color. The most dangerous of the three are the fire geckos. Purple and red colored hides, spikes along their spines and they are fairly tall. They breathe fire and travel in packs. All of them have their own little territories in the Mojave so you will never run into any combination of the three at the same time.

Coyotes are essentially wild dogs that naturally live off the land, eating anything they deem edible. There is nothing really special about coyotes since they are a breed of canines that live more as scavengers than hunters.

After them, Bighorners and Brahmin are up. They are usually tame and used for meat and hides. Wild ones are territorial so if they are attacking, move back the way you came and they will leave you alone.

Mole Rats and Giant Rats are essentially the same with glaring differences. Mole Rats can dig through anything, including metal making them a structural threat but they are mostly passive, preferring to eat plants. Giant Rats can fit through many small openings and travel in numbers. When you see one, you will find close to eight more nearby.

Up next are the insects. Most dangerous of them are the Radscorpions and Bark Scorpions. Radscorpions are large and more armored than the bark ones. They usually charge their prey upon spotting them and come in various sizes, the larger they are the more potent the venom they have. The Bark Scorpions are smaller and usually are used as food for the Radscorpions. The main differences between the two are how they hunt and their venom. Bark Scorpions are more intelligent and try to go around their prey. Their venom is very hazardous, often causing blurry vision upon injection.

Giant mantises are annoying, mostly because they usually fit in with their surroundings. The newborns or 'nymphs' are in vacant areas with no adult nearby while the adults are usually in areas with prospering vegetation.

Giant ants are almost always in large areas with practically nothing near them. A dried lake, an old racing track, I remember seeing some near an abandoned farm. They are easy to spot though so killing them from a distance is not a problem. They do have large numbers though.

Radroaches and Bloatflies are the weakest out here. Bloatflies are territorial but are in locations with decaying bodies like a graveyard or in small irradiated waters. Ignore them and they will ignore you a good majority of the time. Radroaches are essentially the same but they will attack if you get too close. Usually one punch to the two will kill them so no one is really that afraid of them."

Taking all of that in, they come close to a small declination in the road. The girl sees a large roach, one the size of a medium-small dog, to her right. Going stiff, she screams while grabbing her weapon. Yelling "BUG!" at the top of her lungs, she swings with all her might, smacking right into the Radroach. The hunter watches with an amused grin as the Radroach is launched into the far distance landing in the hills somewhere. The far cries of Geckos finding food echoed in the distance.

"I don't think you hit the little guy far enough nor you screamed loud enough. You have a fear of bugs or something?"

Panting due to the scream let loose, she replies, "Not afraid… hate immensely…"

"Good to know, not exactly a fan myself but I try to ignore them for the most part. Got any other questions?"

"Not at the moment, if they come up I will ask then."

"Alright then, well I got some questions for you then. What do you prefer to eat?"

"Meat, lots and lots of meat," she answers with a smile on her face. She gains a far off look in her eyes, jaw dropping a little and drool starts dripping down just as the imagination of eating meat. Her tail is wagging back and forth further emphasizing her love of food.

Chuckling at the sight, the hunter says, "Enough of that around, you will have to try the various forms we got out here to see which one you prefer eating. Just a heads up though, you will eat plants every now and then in case we don't come across any meat."

Continuing on, "You got any skills or talents meant for combat or survival I should know about… other than your ability to knock things into orbit with a single swing."

Thinking on it, she replies, "Well I can control fire, make a ball out of it and throw it at others but I usually make it to warm up the meat I eat."

"A little pyromaniac huh, that will be fun." Remembering something he collected the day before, he reaches into his rucksack and pulls out the Flamer Pistol and the fuel that came with it. "Here you go then, have fun with this if you want to. If you're wondering what that is, it is basically a flamethrower in pistol form."

Taking the offered items and looking at them speculatively, she nods and places the pistol in her back pocket and the fuel in her own rucksack. She nods gratefully at the gift she received.

"That is the last of the questions I got for you… well other than what you call that weapon of yours." Pointing at the pole with the bell, indicating which weapon he was talking about.

The girl shifts said weapon into both her arms, "Where I am from this was called a 'Jiangshi'. It was meant to be rung for the dead after they have been taken to a burial ground. It was something my father left me."

After the explanation they continued on their trip in comforting silence. Coming upon a town split in two by the road, they head towards the right leading into the ruined buildings with small guard posts and tents with a flag picturing a two-headed bear.

The hunter waves his arm towards the wrecked buildings, "Welcome to the outskirts of Primm little lady. Over the bridge that way is the civilian part of Primm where the townsfolk live. We will go over there later today to see if they have anything useful to trade."

Continuing on their way, he leads the girl up a hill with a wall built into it on the left side. A few minutes of walking they come to the remains of the playground. Pointing to the small campfire to the side he informs her, "That is usually where I sleep and cook my food when I am waiting for information on a bounty from my current client. You'll meet him soon, hope you two can get along civilly at least."

Walking southwest of the playground, she starts to notice a building in the distance. Figuring she was looking at their destination, the hunter speaks up. "The shack up ahead is where we will receive and turn in bounties. My 'boss' is a fairly nice man, does what he can to make the lives of the people in the wasteland less shitty than normal. His way of doing it is by keeping track of those in charge or dangerous individuals that get their entertainment from everyone else's misery."

Approaching the shack, the girl took a quick look around, familiarizing her surroundings for future references. The hunter opens the door, holding it for the girl to walk in. She takes a glance at the various objects inside the shack, finding it looking better inside than outside.

The hunter closes the door after entering and walks up to the desk with another man on the other side, typing away on a typewriter. The 'boss' looks up and notices the bounty hunter he has known for a couple weeks now, sending him out for bounties he acquired.

The 'boss' speaks up, "Did you kill Eileen?"

"Yes." He pulls out the small bag containing Eileen's finger and hands it over.

"Good. I think every member of the male species is sleeping a little easier with that bitch dead." He grabs a small pouch from a drawer in his desk containing the caps for the bounty and gives it to the hunter. He looks over and sees the blonde girl with animal features. "Should I be concerned about a little girl following you?"

"Nah, she wants to get into the bounty hunting gig, I'm just showing her the basics and teaching the methods of survival I learned."

"Alright then, well kid my name is Steven Randall, owner and proprietor of Randall & Associates." He sticks out his right hand for to shake hers.

The girl walks up and grabs the hand, shaking it to accept the greeting. Releasing his grip, Steven returns to typing. The hunter taps on the girl's shoulders, motioning with his head towards the door. Following him and exiting the shack, they had back to the playground.

"You've met our boss of sorts. What do you think so far," the hunter asks.

"He didn't care about my features but was more worried about me being a girl with you. Does he often shrug off details like that?"

"I would not know. We've met a little over two weeks ago so I don't know him well enough to answer truthfully."

"Hmm… well he did something you did not do, he introduced himself to me," she pointed out.

Releasing a small bark of laughter, he sticks out his hand. "The name is Clayton, given to me by my mother. Feel free to call me either Clayton or Clay."

The blonde girl repeats her actions earlier and grabs his hand, shaking it. "I'm called Moonlight Flower where I am from, so call me Moonlight for short. Nice to meet you partner."

* * *

 **As a notice, the various mods I play with will be listed so if you don't notice an item in the actual game it is most likely due to it being from a mod.**

 **Project Nevada – Project Nevada Team**

 **New Vegas Bounties 1 – someguy2000**

 **New Vegas Bounties 2 – someguy2000**

 **Russell – someguy2000**

 **Weapon Mods Expanded (WMX) – Artistar**

 **LexFONV Clothing for Type3 – Lexton**

 **Wasters Scarf 2.0 – Urge**

 **Official Pipboy Readius (New Vegas Edition) – Alex Scoprion and Brianide**

 **There are more but those are not going to be part of the story, if they end up being part of it then I will put a notice of it at the end of the chapter.**

 **This is the first story I have actually done and updates will be irregular as it will not be the main focus of my life. Quite frankly I have many ideas for stories with original characters but I will write those when a story is actually done so I can focus only one story at a time without conflicting ideas.**

 **Eventually I will have pictures of what all my characters will end up looking like, just have to get back into practice of drawing them. If anyone wishes to use a character I have made, just ask and I'll give what I can to help you figure out the looks, personality, and abilities the character in question has.**


	2. Bounty Cullen

**Another reminder that I do not own the Fallout series, Ragnarok Online, or the New Vegas Bounties mod. Those are the property of Bethesda Softworks, GRAVITY Co., and someguy2000 respectively. I simply use them to help develop the story and only own my character Clayton.**

* * *

Chapter 2

Bounty Cullen

At the run down playground sat the hunter and his most recent partner. "Right then, let me lay out our current things to do list. First of all, we'll go grab something to eat from Primm, it will help introduce you to the stuff we call 'food' out here."

"Why do you say it like that?" Moonlight asked with a puzzled look on her face.

"Well little lady, a good majority of the food we have is mostly stale food that was prepared and packaged at least 200 years ago. The only fresh forms of food are those that are cooked or the various plants we got growing in the desert. If we come across the right ingredients, I'll show you how to cook them at a campfire." Clayton pauses to drink some water from his canteen.

"Second, I am going to teach ya how to shoot with that .357 Revolver to get you used to it. Hopefully you don't end up shooting all the ammo you got now trying to hit something. I'll set up a small shooting range out here, set up various objects and tell you which to shoot."

"I guess after that, we will both do a small spar against one another, mostly so I can see how you fight and make sure that I don't accidentally put a bullet in you during encounters with hostiles. It will also help you familiarize with how I fight in melee or hand to hand combat. What are your thoughts on that so far?"

Moonlight takes a moment to think over the 'schedule'.

"I do no mind the schedule… I looking forward to our meal though so can we hurry up and get the food?"

Clayton nods with a grin on his face and stands up from the table. Taking his rifle and putting in the lowered position. The two start walking towards Primm. Passing by the defensive positions with a NCR trooper manning each one they reach the bridge. The moment they cross the bridge, Clayton holsters his rifle and walks down the street.

Stopping in front of a building with a sign on top displaying the words 'Mojave Express'; the two walk inside. An older male was leaning on the counter. He looks up after noticing the two new arrivals. "Welcome to Mojave Express, how can I help you two youngsters?"

"Thanks for the greeting old man, the two of us are here to trade, we're looking for food to trade in particular." Clayton reaches for the pouch containing his caps. The older male simply looks at Clayton and nods, getting off his seat behind the counter and goes into the back area. Approaching the refrigerator, he opens it up and informs the duo of its contents for sale.

"We got some Brahmin Meat, Pork n' Beans, Bighorner Meat, Iguana on a Stick, and two helpings of my wife's casserole. Pick what you want and I'll ring it up."

Clayton looks to Moonlight, "Well which of those sound good to you?"

"Whichever of the two meats sound good for me. I never heard of casserole before," she replied. Clayton nods and turns back to the older man. "I'll take the Bighorner Meat, Iguana on a Stick, and Pork n' Beans."

The old man grabs the mentioned items from the fridge and walks back to the counter. Placing them on the counter top, he says, "That will be 36 caps youngster."

Taking out the caps from his pouch, Clayton hands them over and grabs the three items he just bought. Placing the Pork n' Beans can in his rucksack, he hands the other two to his partner.

"Thanks for the food old man Nash. See ya later on in life for future business." Clayton and Moonlight exit the building, heading back the way they came.

* * *

Arriving back at the playground, Clayton goes to the campfire. Putting his rucksack down, he digs through it bringing out some old looking books and places them in the campfire. Reaching into his pocket he grabs his cigarette lighter and flicks it open. Trying several times to light it, the campfire blazes into life. Clayton just looks at the fire then turns to his partner.

Moonlight is smirking at him while throwing a ball of fire up and down from her left hand. "Told you I can control fire, lighting those books of yours is easy." Clayton stares at her, "Fair enough, saves on the fuel in this thing too."

Reaching into his rucksack once more, he grabs a pot, a pan, and a spoon. "Let me cook up the Bighorner Meat first, you can go ahead and eat once it is done." He places the Bighorner Meat on the pan and sets it on the fire. Waiting for a few minutes and flipping the meat to cook both sides, the meat is fully cooked after fifteen minutes. Taking the pan off the fire, he places the Bighorner Steak on one of the plates that cluttered the picnic tables. Setting the plate down; Clayton returns to the campfire and opens up the can of Pork n' Beans. Placing its contents into the pot, he picks up the spoon and stirs every now and then.

Moonlight is sitting at the picnic table enjoying her freshly cooked meat. The flavor of whatever a Bighorner is supposed to be is rather pleasing to her taste buds. Clayton joins her at the table soon after, bringing the pot of Pork n' Beans and the Iguana on a Stick. Sitting across from his partner, he starts with the iguana. Looking at the blonde, Clayton smirks in amusement at seeing her blissful expression from eating Bighorner Steak. Finishing off his iguana and moving onto his Pork n' Beans, he eats quickly and quietly as he usually does.

Clayton looks over to his partner seeing her finishing up her own meal. He stands up and moves around the playground, picking up the various Tin Cans and empty bottles that litter the area. The hunter sets them up in various spots. The slide, grill, tables, the merry-go-round, on some of the rocks, and the chairs, they all had either an empty can or bottle in varying numbers on them.

After putting the last of the improvised targets into place, Clayton turns to Moonlight and informs her, "Alright, the cans and bottles you see everywhere are going to be your targets, I'll get other targets to set up in the future to represent targets to not shoot. Now bring out your revolver and the rounds."

The fox girl does just that, putting the rounds on the table she sat at. Clayton moves over to his rucksack and pulls out the four rounds he looted the day before. He hands them over to his partner. "Now before you begin, tell me how you think the revolver is reloaded and prepared to fire."

The young girl looks at her revolver from various angles, trying to see where the rounds go into. As she was turning the pistol around and ready to point the end of the barrel towards her, Clayton shoots his hand out and covered both her hand and revolver.

"Never point the barrel at whatever you are not going to shoot, especially yourself. It is best to treat every gun like it is loaded whether or not it is," Clayton reprimanded.

His companion shyly nods and continues examining her revolver, taking care not to point the weapon at her or her instructor. Seeing the chamber has several holes, she tries to move the chamber into a position where loading will be easier. Finding six holes, she grabs six rounds and looking over said rounds, she places them into the chamber. Filling up the chamber, she moves the chamber back into place. Spending a moment to look over the revolver again to determine how to get it ready to shoot, she pulls the trigger and nothing happens.

She looks to Clayton, who just walks over and grabs her free hand and moves her hand to pull the hammer back. With a 'tock' the hammer is locked as far back as it can go. Stepping back, he speaks up, "Alright then, follow me, you are going to shoot from 25 meters away."

As she followed, she wondered what a meter was. Arriving at the appropriate distance, Clayton digs his heel into the ground and drags it to create a line. Moving to stand near his current student, he tells her, "Get into a firing position, I'll help correct your form after your first shot."

Moonlight raises her arm and aims the revolver down range. She pulls the trigger, shooting at the bottle on the table. The recoil from the shot threw off her aim, the bullet going further up than what she intended and hit one of the rocks protruding from the ground. She looks at where the bullet landed and moves her eyes to stare at the revolver in her hand. Clayton moves up and shakes her shoulder to get her attention. Moonlight looks at him and sees his mouth moving but no sounds coming out. Absently she noted that there was a ringing sound in her head.

Clayton sees that his words were falling on (temporarily) deaf ears so he simply waited for the girl to respond. After a minute, the young female starts to hear the sounds of the life in the Mojave again. She speaks up, "Sorry, couldn't hear a word you said after I pulled the trigger."

The male looks down at her and ponders if having a gun is a bad idea due to her higher sense of hearing. Taking a moment to think it over, he came to a decision. "Seems to me that you firing a gun without a silencer is probably a bad thing seeing how they are a little debilitating for you. You will probably need to stick to the Flamer Pistol and your Jiangshi. If we come across other energy weapons, you can try those out and see if they will be preferable for you."

She looks up to Clayton, and then looks back down at the revolver in her hand. "So what will we do with this then?"

"Sell it, get a couple caps that we can use it for supplies. Probably best if you take care of those that get too close and let me stick with hostiles or targets further out. Throw those fireballs of yours out every now and then to keep them from hiding."

Clayton walks back over to his rucksack and removes his rifle and the two pistols on his person and places them on the ground next to the rucksack. Grabbing hold of the Sawed-off Shotgun, he removes the two shells and places both the gun and shells in his bag. Turning around, he calmly moves west of the playground to a more open area. Getting into position, he pulls out the Combat Knife he looted off Eileen.

Moonlight, seeing what her companion was doing grabbed her Jiangshi and jogged to the same area a little ways away from Clayton. Getting into her regular combat position, Clayton spoke up.

"This is how we're going to fight, if you land a clean hit on me then you will get one point. If I move the knife into a vital area on your body, I get one point. First to three points will be the victor. This will give me an idea of how you deal with people who have more experience with close quarters combat. I will give you pointers at the end depending on how well you do overall."

Clayton reaches into one of his pockets and pulls out a .44 Round. "I am going to toss this into the air and when it lands is when we will begin fighting." Lowering his arm to begin collecting momentum, he lobs the round into the air and immediately gets into his own fighting position. The 'Emasculator' held in his right hand reverse gripped, his left hand open and both at chest level.

The airborne round reached the apex of its flight upwards after two seconds and started its descent. When it landed, evident of the small puff of dust that kicked up, the shorter of the two shot off with her weapon in position to begin a horizontal swing.

Right as the swing began in motion, Clayton takes a step back and leans back enough that both the pole and the bell miss by half an inch. Quickly taking a step forward to get in close; Clayton ducks under the backhand swing of the girl's rotation. His left hand springs out, catching the blonde's opposite shoulder to slow her momentum and his right hand grasping the Combat Knife launches forward like a snake. Moonlight feels the blade of the knife on her neck.

"First point goes to me little lady." Removing his grasp on her should and the blade from her neck, Clayton moves back into his starting position.

Moving his left hand to have the palm facing up, he flexes his fingers to say 'Bring it on'. The girl happily obliges, swinging her weapon above her head to gain additional power through momentum. After a few rotations, she slams it into the ground, causing a small crater to form and dust to kick up to form a temporary smokescreen.

Brown eyes behind red tinted sunglasses gaze from one end of the smokescreen to the other. Spotting a slightly darker portion of the dust with a human like silhouette move back a bit before charging forward, Clayton moves forward. With a small step to his left, he swung his right leg down and out in a leg sweep to trip his opponent. She jumps over the leg and starts to twist her body to keep him in her line of sight. Unfortunately, Clayton's left hand reaches out and grabs her furred covered leg in mid-air, halting the movement of said leg and causing rest of her body to move towards the ground.

The blonde's back landing on the ground with a 'thud', she swings her other leg out to both keep Clayton back and to give herself enough speed to flip her body into a more favorable position.

His fingerless glove releases its hold on her leg and his spine arches back to dodge the incoming limb. Jumping back into the clearing dust, Clayton readies himself for another attack from the fox girl.

Moonlight brings her pole up and starts to swing it in a circle above her once again. Advancing towards Clayton, she keeps rotating her weapon and when she got close enough angled the swing so that it barely scrapes the ground. The male rolls to the side in the direction of the swing, leaping right in front of her cause the girl to squeak in surprise and lean back. His left hand reaches for and grasps her poncho, pulling her closer and moving his knife towards her torso. Resting the point of the knife where her heart is Clayton speaks up, "That is two points for me now. One more and it is my win."

Moving back several feet, Clayton once again gets into ready position. Not even waiting for another signal to start, the girl moves forward with her weapon resting on her shoulder and twists her body for a side kick. The hunter dodges the kick but she continues her spin, performing a leg sweep. Hopping over the attack, Clayton sees the girl still spinning only with a leg rising up and coming down as an axe kick. Dodging to the left, her heel slams into the ground and the force of the rotation had her dragging it across the ground.

Clayton moves forward in an attempt to strike but ducks under the bell as it moved under the force of her spinning. The girl then jumps, rolling above the male and lands on his other side. Upon landing, she brings up her right leg to knee Clayton's right side.

The hunter tosses his knife up, catching it reverse grip with his left hand and uses his right arm to trap her knee between his arm and torso. Twisting his body slightly, his left arm stretches out and his moves his fist just past her chin, the blade of the knife once again resting on her neck.

"And that is three. Nice try little lady," Clayton said as he moves the knife away from the girl's neck and removes his hold on her leg. Moonlight slightly pouts at not scoring any points in the fight.

After collecting the .44 Round that started the practice match, both of them move back towards their rucksacks and Clayton just sits down on the ground. "From what I can tell about how you fight, is that you prefer using momentum to increase the power of your attacks. The flow of your attacks varied but that last one was definitely your best one in my opinion. Using a dust cloud to impair vision is a nice touch but that only works when your opponent is either incompetent or submersed in the cloud."

The blonde looks at her companion and takes a seat on the ground herself. "So what tips are you going to give to help the way I fight?"

"Well, you don't need to increase the power from your attacks; you are already stronger than most things in the wasteland. You can probably punch a Deathclaw once and kill it, if not then it will definitely be stunned for a second or two. Everything else you will knock quite a distance away from you. My suggestion, focus on speedy and random attacks." Clayton pulls out his canteen to take a sip of water and continues. "I could actually tell what your next attack was going to be like in most cases and the speed of the attacks was easy to follow. It also helps to have a weapon that is more balanced than your Jiangshi. An added weight on the other side of the pole would probably be best as then you can hold it differently to both attack and defend. You don't have to follow these tips though, just pointing them out."

The short blonde takes a moment to digest the advice she had been given. After a minute of thinking she speaks up, "How would we balance out my Jiangshi? I mean what exactly is going to be put on the other end?"

"That all depends of what you want on the other end. The only two suggestions I got are putting either the head of a Sledgehammer or the head of Fire Axe on it, the first one for blunt damage while the other is for cutting. Sledgehammers are more common than Fire Axes though but like I said, it is your choice."

The two fall into a comforting silence. Clayton reaches into his pocket and pulls out the rectangular device to check the time. Moonlight looks over and sees the object in his hand.

"What is that for," she asks. Clayton answers with his eyes still on the device.

"This little thing is called a Readius, think of it as a data storage device. I found this a long time ago when I was scavenging through some ruined buildings, of course back then it was in horrible condition. Took it to the Followers of the Apocalypse, and while it was not repaired completely, they did repair the functions I cared about." Turning the device towards her, she sees the screen displaying a picture with squares in it with a small triangle flashing on and off.

"What you are seeing right now is the map, the triangle is our current position. There was a function to add location points but that wasn't fixed. It has the coordinates and time at the top right. The other function that I really cared about was the radio." Clayton turns the screen back to him and switches over to the radio. Selecting the radio station 'Radio New Vegas', the voice of a male comes out.

"… to our program. This is Mr. New Vegas, and each and every one of you is wonderful in your own special way. You know, I think all news, whether it's good or bad, brings us all together. Don't you? Citizens of Outer Vegas are flocking to the Strip in droves amid a wave of terror caused by a band of raiders known as the Fiends. Those who can afford passports say that the added security is well worth the price of admission. That news was brought to you by The Tops Casino. You'll dig us baby, we're the tops. More classics coming right up for you, so stay tuned."

Music starts playing and the very sounds of the instruments calms Moonlight. Clayton turns the radio off and the blonde speaks out, "Hey I was enjoying that."

Clayton chuckles softly. "You can listen to it later, besides I listen to that station for the news, the music I prefer is on Mojave Music Radio. The other function of the Readius that was fixed was the Geiger counter. It helps determine how much radiation is in the area and on me. There are other functions but since they weren't repaired, it only shows the word 'ERROR' in those spots."

The young female looks at him with a face that screams 'Put the music back on'. Clayton shrugs and selects Mojave Music Radio, letting the songs play out once more. He hands the device over to the girl and goes through his rucksack, taking out his weapons.

Moonlight looks at the Readius with amazement in her eyes as the music continues to play. After Clayton has all of his weapons holstered or on a sling, he watches the girl enjoy the songs being played from the radio station. Fifteen minutes pass and he takes back the device, turning off the radio, and places it back into his pocket.

"It is a little before four in the afternoon, so you ready to start on your first bounty?"

She gives him an odd look, "Now? Are we going to walk all night to the target?"

"Whoever the next bounty is on, they could be farther or closer than what my last one was. Besides, we grab the information and plan after that, we don't have to go immediately."

Putting on his rucksack, Clayton grabs the other bag and hands it over to his companion. "Come on then, let us see Steven for our next job."

Entering the shack, the both of them stand in front of the desk and Steven looks up from his typing.

"You ready to work," he asks the two.

"Yes."

"Good, this next bastard has it comin'." Fishing through his desk, Steven grabs the bounty sheet and another sheet of paper. Handing over the bounty sheet to Clayton he speaks up. "His name is Cullen, and he's the new leader of the Jackals. For years the NCR has kicked the shit out of the Jackals, but since the Republic is occupied with Caesar, the raiders are recuperating. Even the sorry ass Jackals are getting back on their feet thanks to the charismatic Mr. Cullen."

Turning over the sheet of paper he still had to read off the information of Cullen's deeds. "He's been responsible for numerous attacks on the roads south of Vegas, and he's developed a reputation of brutality and cunning. In short, his attacks are bad for business, so certain people want him removed. He's hiding out at that old police station south of town. Good luck."

Steven returns his attention to his typing while Clayton and Moonlight leave. The girl looks at Clayton and asks, "Do wanted people always seem to stay in one place or is information widely known for bounty hunters?"

The male just shrugs and replies, "Most cases that is how it seems to happen, they do tend to have reasons for stayin' in one spot. They usually stay due to having allies surrounding them like in this case Cullen would have several other members of the Jackals near him." He pauses as if struck by a stray thought. "Well if he was actually as smart as well as cunning then he should have others near him."

Bringing the bounty sheet he was given up, he starts to read.

**PROPERTY OF RANDALL AND ASSOCIATES**  
Target: Cullen  
Race: Caucasian  
Allegiance/Faction: Jackals  
Location: Nevada Highway Patrol Station

Notes: Under Cullen's spirited leadership, the typically timid Jackals are rediscovering their backbone. Their young leader has developed a habit for conducting brazen attacks on convoys, which is deleterious for commerce. If money talks, our client is practically screaming; eliminate Cullen and the firm will get a much-needed fiscal injection.

-Randall

"What does that say that Steven did not already explain?" The girl's voice brings Clayton's attention away from the bounty sheet. Looking at her he answers, "Pretty much the same thing with different wording, with the added bonus of the firm getting more money if completed and possibly more contracts."

Stowing away the bounty paper, he brings out his Readius and selecting the map function. Kneeling down and gesturing the fox girl to come closer. Pointing at the spot between the roads of Primm and the junction further down he speaks up, "The place is around this area, with us walking down the road it will be on the right. Luckily for us it is nearby so we can do this before night starts settling in."

Standing back up and moving his Marksman Carbine into a lowered position, Clayton asks his partner, "Ready for your first bounty?"

Moving her Jiangshi so that it rested on her shoulder, she answers, "Sure am."

They walk down the path and reach the road. An hour of traveling south, they both see a building in the distance. Gesturing to the large billboards on the other side of the road; the duo move in between the advertising signs for cover and concealment.

Bringing out his Binoculars, he looks over the building and its surrounding area for any sign of Jackals. Scanning the area for a couple minutes he lowers the Binoculars.

"Don't see any of the Jackals from this angle, you hear anything from here?"

Moonlight blinks for a moment before moving a bit so her ears can be outside the billboards. Closing her eyes and focusing on hearing. Several minutes pass when she opens her eyes to relay her findings.

"Nothing from the direction of the hideout, I just hear the usual noise going off in the rest of the Mojave."

Clayton nods and stashes his Binoculars back into his duster pocket. "Right then, follow me and keep both your head and voice low. Best if we are not heard nor seen coming."

Moving back across the street and using the small hills and outcropping rocks to hide their forms. Silently moving up and reaching the back of the building. Kneeling once more, he whispers to his partner. "What about now, hear anything out here?"

She closes her eyes once more to focus on hearing anything close by while Clayton keeps an eye out on the surroundings for threats. With her eyes still closed, she whispers back, "Nothing out here but I can hear a couple of people inside. I hear a scratching noise too."

Clayton nods and steadily walks alongside the walls of the building with Moonlight following. Arriving at the front of the patrol station, he looks around noticing the glass is extremely obscured. Activating his Bionic Eye and turning his vision to infrared, he sees two people inside the entry room. Turning his vision back to normal, he speaks in a low volume, "I see only two people alive inside, nothing about what caused that scratchin' noise you heard."

Moving to the door he pulls out one of his Stun Grenades and whispers to the girl. "Open the door so I can toss this inside. Close the door after it goes and wait till you hear an explosion before opening it again." She nods in confirmation and places a hand on the door handle. Looking at Clayton, he starts counting down silently from three. After he mouths the word one, he pulls the pin while she opens the door.

Throwing the Stun Grenade inside, the fox girl slams the door shut. The slight outcry of pain signified that the projectile bounced off one of the two inside. The resounding 'pop' from the Stun Grenade came first then the opening of the doors follows.

Clayton brings up his rifle and scans the room looking for targets. Finding the two on the ground, one is holding onto her head and the other gripping a nearby desk as to try to steady herself. Taking aim at the one grabbing hold of the desk he pulls the trigger, the bullet piercing her heart. Moonlight moves towards the other one and stomps her foot onto her neck. The last of the occupants scratches at her neck, unable to breathe. Eventually her movements became less frequent until it stopped completely.

Looking around the room quickly, he speaks out an observation. "Doesn't look like Cullen is here, must be out doing a caravan raid." Moving towards the other door in the room, he catches movement in his peripheral. Shifting his sight, he sees a Giant Mantis Nymph.

"…I found the source of that scratchin' noise." He calmly grabs a book lying on top of the nearby desk and tosses it at the mantis. The force of the airborne book sends the green insect towards the wall. Hearing the thud, Moonlight looks over and sees the insect.

"Bug…" she whispers to herself and walks to the file cabinets along the wall. The fox girl tips the entire cabinet over, the weight of the items inside and the office furniture itself easily crushing the mantis and the book that smashed it to the wall.

Clayton stares blankly at the scene and promptly decides to continue searching the station. Entering the hallway and opening the door at the far back he sees more Giant Mantis Nymphs behind the bars of the jail cell. 'Yeah, better not show this to her, no telling what she will end up doing.'

Closing the door and walking back, he speaks up to his partner, "No other people 'sides us here… and the dead." Moonlight just mumbles about a waste of time before freezing in place. Her ear twitches and she quickly face the door leading outside. Seeing the girl's actions, Clayton brings his rifle up to firing position and aims at the door.

The worn doors open and a man wearing Metal Armor enters the building dragging a Fire Axe across the ground. He halts his movements and stares at the two people in his hideout. He loudly speaks out, "Who the fuck are you?"

His answer was a 5.56 round entering through his left eye and exiting the back of his skull. Clayton, still aiming at the newcomer, spoke up. "He matches the description… what little there was, so he might be Cullen." Moonlight slowly crept over to the most recent corpse and pulled it further inside, the doors leading outside closing shortly after.

She picks up the Fire Axe after removing it from the grasp of the corpse. Test swinging it a few times, she accidentally knocks over a couple Coffee Mugs that were resting on the nearby tables. "…Whoops."

"You go and look through the other two bodies, see if there is something we can use or sell. I'll cut this guy's finger off, hopefully it is Cullen." She sets off to the two dead females while Clayton removes the metal and glove off of the left hand. Pulling out the Emasculator, he cuts off the finger and stashes it into the glove. Placing the improvised bag into a pocket of his duster, he stands back up.

The doors open up once more and a male wearing Reinforced Leather Armor and armed with a Lever Action Shotgun enters the building. He raises his shotgun at Clayton and speaks up.

"Collectin on another one of my bounties huh? You're taking a bite out of my income, kid. I want my ends right now, or it is your ass. Fork it over, right now. 1000 caps."

Clayton gives a hard glare at the current hostile, 'Kid? We look about the same age.' His reply is short and sweet.

"Fuck you, freak."

The intruder chuckles lightly, "Well you got some fight in you. If that is how you…" He is cut off when a Fire Axe is thrown and the blade is lodged into his skull and his body thrown back by the force of the throw. The body lands and skids across the dusty road outside.

Clayton looks back at his partner with an eyebrow raised. She smiles sheepishly and scratches her cheek. Shaking his head, he walks over to the newest corpse and goes through the pockets and pouches for anything useful. Finding a note among the empty shell casings in one of the pouches, he reads aloud for his partner to hear.

"Coyote,

After your inquiry into the paucity of contracts of late, I investigated the matter in full.

It's come to my attention that a new firm, 'Randall and Associates' has been utilizing Clayton, an up and coming contractor in the Mojave.

Your unquestioning loyalty and determination to see the success of our organization is appreciated, so consider this information a token of our continuing partnership. I trust you will deal with the matter shortly.

Sincerely,

Judge Richter."

The bounty hunter groans. "I can deal with competition between other bounty hunters but an organization?" He just sighs while Moonlight walks over and removes the Fire Axe from the newly named 'Coyote'. "I have your back in that case so you don't have to worry."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence but organizations tend to have a working information gathering network, so we have to reveal less and less of what we can do to surprise them in case they try to kill us." Taking a quick mental checklist of weapons and ammo, he continues on. "We're going to have to get extra firepower, more in the form of you actually having a decent ranged weapon and more explosives for clusters of enemies."

Grabbing the Lever Action Shotgun and stowing it away in his rucksack, he speaks up. "Did you get anything from the other two inside?"

Nodding her head once, "Just a revolver, although the part that holds the rounds seem smaller than the one you tried to give me." She reaches behind her and hands over the revolver in question. Looking it over and seeing what she was referring to, Clayton figures the revolver is chambered for .22 rounds.

"Eh, it will fetch a few caps seein' how the rounds for this thing are meant more for killing in a surprise attack than in a fire fight." He hands it back to her and motions with his head to follow.

* * *

Traveling back north along I-15, the duo of bounty hunter and fox girl reach the shack of their boss. Upon entering, Steven Randall is typing away at his desk. The girl mumbles out, "Does he do anything other than working on that thing?" Her voice served to grab Steven's attention and asked "Is Cullen dead?"

Clayton grabs the glove containing Cullen's finger and replies "Yes" before handing it over. Reaching over the typewriter and across his desk, Steven grabs the glove and looks inside, seeing the finger. Putting the glove down on his desk, he opens up the same drawer from before and pulls out a small pouch containing the reward for the bounty. Handing it over, he tells the two, "Outstanding job. Come back when you're ready for work."

Opening the pouch and counting the caps, Clayton nods his head to Steven and exits the shack with Moonlight following.

"How much we get," she asks.

"500 caps," he replies. Taking 250 caps out of the pouch, he hands the rest over to her. "This is your half." She grabs the bag and shakes it, hearing the clinging of the metallic caps.

"So what now?"

Clayton pulls out the Readius and looks at the time, "It is almost 1900 hours, so night is going to be coming soon. We should go grab food from Old man Nash before calling it a day."

Agreeing with the plan, mostly for the food, they set off towards Primm once more to grab their meals. Entering the 'Mojave Express', the two see Jonathan Nash sleeping at the counter with his head resting in the palm of his left hand. Ruby Nash is in the room as well and notices the two.

"Hey there, what are you two lookin' for," she greets them.

"Something to eat and possibly a few bottles of water," Clayton answers.

"Right then, want some of my casserole? I just finished making a few batches not long ago."

Clayton looks down to his partner and asks, "Ya want some?" Moonlight just shrugs and replies, "Sure why not?" Looking back to Mrs. Nash, "Sure, two servings of your casserole please."

Ruby smiles and moves towards the back of the building, grabbing the casserole and a four bottles of water, she places them on the front counter. Placing her hand on her husband's shoulder, she wakes him up. Speaking softly, "We got customers, two casseroles and four bottles of water."

Jonathan Nash wakes up with a silent yawn and looks at the customers. "Ah, howdy there youngsters, let me add up the price for these real quick." Mentally adding up the prices of the bottles of water and then the casserole, he came to "100 caps."

Pulling out the Lever Action Shotgun and motioning for the .22 Revolver, he places them on the counter, "How much are these two worth for you?"

Jonathan picks up the revolver first, looking it over determining the cost based on the condition of the small firearm. He places it back down and picks up the shotgun. Emptying it of the shells that were loaded into it, he examines the shotgun. Still holding onto the shotgun, he replies, "The revolver is in bad condition so it is worth only 12 caps, the shotgun is worth 139, the shells are only worth 4. Total comes out to 155 caps."

Reaching under the counter top, he pulls out 55 caps and slides them over the counter along with the food and water. Clayton pockets the caps and stores the water in his rucksack. Grabbing hold of one of the casseroles, he thanks the older man for his business. Moonlight grabs the other casserole and follows after her partner.

The two get back to the campsite they used earlier and after placing a few more books in the pile to burn, the two settle down at one of the tables and start eating. "How did your first bounty feel little lady?"

The girl, pauses her eating, answers after a bit of thought. "It seemed too easy to me. Besides the other bounty hunter making a surprise visit, it was over fairly quick."

Clayton hummed in agreement, "We did get the drop on them, which is always better in my book, less ammo wasted and injuries to deal with." The two continue eating in peace.

After the meal was done with, the duo sat at the fire, simply watching it go on in comforting silence. Clayton speaks up after a few minutes, "Are you alright with sleeping out here or do you want to sleep elsewhere?"

"Here is fine," she replies.

Nodding his head, he moves back towards the rock wall with the improvised ceiling of sheet metal. Removing his rucksack, rifle, and duster he sits down and places the bag beside him. Leaning his rifle against the rocky wall, he removes his hat and puts it on the barrel end of the rifle. Moonlight walks over, takes off her own rucksack and places it next to his. Sitting in between his legs, she gets comfortable while Clayton drapes his duster over the two of them.

The two lay there in silence, enjoying the warmth of both each other and the nearby fire. Watching as the flames flicker, the girl slowly drifts to sleep while the man continues to remain awake. Keeping his gaze on the fire until it became nothing more than a smoking pile of ash, he moves his sights to the heavens. The starts light up the sky, giving him a sense of contentment.

A few minutes of staring into the starry night sky, he too starts to fall asleep.

* * *

 **Yay, finally got this chapter done. It took awhile due to the fact I have been working at a Boy Scout camp for the past month and a half. At the time this chapter is posted, I have received no reviews or pms, which to me mean that those that have read my story are neutral about it. Also at the time of this chapters posting, I will be going through the first chapter making corrections to small problems like making line breaks and fixing the line spacing.**

 **On another note, if you feel like using any character I have made… which in this story is just Clayton and the personality of Moonlight, feel free to ask and I'll help flesh out the more important parts and the smaller details if necessary.**


	3. Bounty Tony Idaho

**This is the last reminder that I do not own the Fallout series, Ragnarok Online, or the New Vegas Bounties mod. Those are the property of Bethesda Softworks, GRAVITY Co., and someguy2000 respectively.**

* * *

Chapter 3

Bounty Tony Idaho

The bounty hunting duo is sleeping alongside the rock wall of their camp and seems to have gotten company as they slept. Clayton wakes up first and quickly notices the extra weight that seems to be resting on his right arm. Shifting his eyes on his arm, he sees the new addition to their resting place was a coyote pup. Turning his head, he scans the area to see where the rest of the pack or at least the mother was. None appeared to be in his line of sight so he patiently waits for his partner to wake up.

Moving his sight to the sky, Clayton watches the small forms of clouds go by. Close to fifteen minutes go by and the blonde girl starts to stir. She begins to lift her body up to a sitting position and rub her eyes. Moving the duster the two of them used as a blanket aside; Moonlight stands up and starts stretching to remove the kinks in her body. During her stretches, she notices the coyote pup sleeping on Clayton's arm.

Continuing on with her morning activity, she questions her partner. "What is with the one sleeping on your arm? More importantly, what are we doing today?"

Clayton starts to shake the coyote pup while simultaneously answering. "Go out and hunt some Geckos, get their meat for food and hide to either sell or use. After that, grab another bounty from Stephen." The pup starts to wake up with a yawn.

The two watch as the coyote pup gets up and walks through the playground area and towards the canyon to the west. Clayton speaks his thoughts aloud, "Wonder what that little guy was doing sleeping with us." Both of them shrug their shoulders and continue on with their morning.

Putting his duster back on, Clayton reaches for his rifle and rucksack. His partner grabs both her stuff and his attention. "Is there any way I can take a bath?"

"You got two options here. One is the small pond just down the path but that is dirty water… which means it has a small dose of radiation in it. The second is up near Goodsprings water source. I suggest the latter as we can hunt the Geckos near it on our way to and from. Besides, that water is clean and we can fill up the water bottles."

Smiling at her partner's answer, Moonlight walks over to the edge of the playground leading to Primm. Clayton keeps his rifle lowered, ready to bring up in case of threats. The two walk north on I-15 and open with small talk.

Moonlight starts off with, "How long have you been a bounty hunter?"

"Close to two years now, but before I worked for Steven, the bounties were on low paying targets. Before that I was a mercenary for eight years. I was part of the Desert Rangers fourteen years ago, but it disbanded due to supply shortage and the NCR taking over the duties we had. The training and experience will stick with me till the day I die."

His partner hums in acknowledgement. "What was it like for each of those employments?"

"Huh… well the Desert Rangers were the military force here in Mojave and we were tasked with defense only. No expansion or aggressive intentions, just protection of the inhabitants of the Mojave. Granted the Desert Rangers were one of the most dangerous folks ever, a single soldier can take on around a platoons worth of enemy soldiers. Course, we had to be since we had very little in terms of supplies."

Taking the time to think on the other two professions he has done, the two make it to the road leading to Goodsprings.

"Mercenary work was not that much difficult, just the occasional raider attacks and escort of caravans or person across the Mojave. I'd say the worst in that period of time was when I was guarding a caravan with a newbie guard. Poor guy did not know how to aim correctly, used his gun as a club than a projectile weapon. The trader in charge of that particular caravan was pretty easy going though, was willing to give the guy experience. We got ambushed between the 188 and New Vegas. The guard was shot in the leg and the trader in the arm. The two did end up getting the ones who shot them, though the guard was more due to luck then actual skill. I ended up fighting against three others; one had a Flamer so I was set on fire a bit. Best thing about being a mercenary is after awhile, you get contacts and informants about jobs and current info on local areas."

The two reach the part of the road with a clearing nearby containing unlit campfires, the duo stroll into the small hill areas to the north of said clearing. Hearing the call of some Geckos, Clayton brings up his rifle and takes aim. Three Geckos run down the hill with their mouths wide open. Opening fire, one goes down in two shots and another with three. The last Gecko is introduced to the pole of Jiangshi then the rock wall.

Clayton moves up the hill with his rifle, ready to shoot others. Seeing none near the water source he moves back and lowers his rifle. Grabbing one of the Geckos by the tail, he drags it up the hill to the water. "Grab one and bring it up will you little lady?"

Moving her weapon to rest on her shoulder, she grabs the one laying dead against the rock wall. Jogging slightly to catch up with the Gecko being dragged over small rocks, Moonlight looks at the source of water and feels a small tinge of disappointment.

"This is what I am going to take a bath with," she complained while dropping the Gecko she dragged. Clayton looks over at her and taps the nearby bucket with his boot. "You can use the bucket to pour the water on you to clean up." He walks back down the hill to grab the last Gecko. The blonde just huffs and takes off her rucksack, setting it down nearby. She strips her clothes off and places them with her sack.

Clayton comes back with the last Gecko and places the corpse next to its deceased kin. Setting his rucksack and rifle down, he grabs the Emasculator and starts cutting into the Geckos to gather the meat. The sounds of water sloshing around and being poured fill the area.

"You know, for water being out in the sun like this, it is actually nice and cold." Clayton glances over, seeing his partner naked and sunlight reflecting off of the water covering her body. "It is from under the ground so the water is naturally going to be colder." He turns back to his work of collecting meat from the freshly killed Geckos.

He started to skin the Geckos as Moonlight started to shake off the excess water on her body and tail. She moved over to her belongings and proceeded to put her clothes back on. Clayton finished skinning the first Gecko and placed the meat from all three into a pile, covering the stack with the hide. The blonde finished clothing herself and walked into her partner's peripheral.

"Need me to do anything right now," she queried.

"Grab the empty bottles we have in our bags and fill them up." Pausing in his work, he grabs his canteen and hands it over to her. "Fill up our canteens too, after that see about lighting a campfire so we can heat the meat up and eat our breakfast."

Grabbing the offered canteen and rummaging through his rucksack for the empty bottles. Holding onto what she could, she started to fill them all up. Going to her bag, she grabbed the bottles and filled them up. Finishing her task, she turned and saw Clayton skinning the last Gecko. Walking over and grabbing the hide containing the meat, she wanders down the hill to the campfire. Setting the improvised sack down, she conjures up a ball of fire and tosses it into the pile of combustibles, setting it ablaze.

Clayton comes back down the hill with his rucksack on and carrying the other two hides. Coming to the campfire, he sets his bag down and brings out the pan to cook the meat. Placing one of the slabs of meat onto the pan, he rests it on the fire. Moonlight is nearby sitting on her rucksack watching the meat cook. "What are you going to do with the hides?"

Flipping the meat so that it is cooked thoroughly, he replies, "Try to make a bag out of one, other than that sell the others for a pretty cap." Thinking on the subject a bit more, he speaks his thoughts out. "Could always tan the hides and use them as armor reinforcement. Would help in the future but these hides are not that thick. Better to use Fire Gecko hides."

The younger of the two grunts in agreement. A thought occurs to her, "Hey do Geckos always run like they did, I was about to start laughing at how they ran."

Clayton grins while the meat continues to cook. "Yeah, they all do run like that until they get in range of their bites. My suggestion, laugh after you kill them until you see it enough times that it becomes lame or routine. People live longer if they do that."

"Hmm, alright then. How do geckos taste?"

"Not as good as Bighorners or Brahmin, but it still fills folks up and gives enough nutrients to continue living." Reaching into his bag, he pulls out a plate and places the freshly cooked meat onto it. "Here ya go, careful it is still hot now."

Moonlight grabs the plate while Clayton places another slab of meat onto the pan. She picks up the freshly cooked steak with her fur covered hand and starts biting it. Verifying what her partner had said about comparing the taste to the Bighorner Steak she ate last time, the meat from Geckos were more stringy than juicy.

Finishing cooking the meat on the pan, Clayton waits till his companion eats her steak. When she devoured the rest of her share of the meat, she handed the plate back. Placing his steak onto the plate he starts to eat while Moonlight drinks from her canteen.

Eating his steak and taking a few gulps of water from his own canteen, the two clean up and start walking back to pick up another bounty. Spotting and killing five more Geckos along the way, they skin and collect the meat for future consumption.

* * *

The duo makes it back to the shack of their employer and walk inside, enjoying the shade provided by the walls and ceiling.

Steven Randall looks up from his work, seeing the two he initiates the usual greeting. "I got another bounty if you're ready for work."

Clayton recalls the question his partner asked earlier in the day and decided to ask one of his own to his client. "What's the most dangerous bounty you ever pursued?"

Steven stalled in his work at the sudden question, "The most dangerous? Hmm… I'd have to think about that." Taking a minute to recall his past experiences for one in particular, he continued. "There's tons of men that were pretty mean, and more than a few were just crazy. But dangerous? I'd have to go with Doc Friday."

Leaning back in his chair, Steven gets more comfortable to continue with his tale. "Ol' Doc isn't your typical doctor- I'd heard he was an orthodontist before the war, whatever the fuck that is." The duo also ponders what an orthodontist was but Steven pushed on unaware of their thinking.

"Doc's a ghoul gunslinger, and I'm speaking about him in present tense because he's almost certainly still alive. Years ago a bounty came up on Doc because he had shot an actor in the testicles." Both males wince after that sentence while the lone female raised an eyebrow. "I never liked actors, so I decided to give Doc a chance and explain his side of the story. He was quite affable, despite being a ghoul. So many of them were self-pitying pissants, but Doc never whined- he just treated everyone with courtesy."

Steven pauses to drink from his coffee mug. "We talked it over, and he was so damn likeable I agreed to settle his bounty on a game of cards." 'Love to share a drink with that kind of guy if that was true," thought Clayton.

"Sure enough, that slick bastard took me for everything, so I let him go. I'm glad I did, because later I heard about his reputation. Despite his polite nature, Ol' Doc is the fastest goddamn pistol in the region, maybe in the whole fucking continent. I heard he once smoked an entire squad of legionaries that tried to arrest him for drug smuggling. He wiped them out in seconds, supposedly."

The red haired bounty hunter whistles in appreciation at the actions of Doc Friday. Steven hums in agreement of the whistle and pushes on, "He still drifts from here to there, always with that ghoul whore at his side. 'No-face Kate' was her name, I think. If you ever encounter him, I'd advise you to return his courtesy." A sudden thought struck him, "Shit, I got distracted again! Are you gonna work or not, damnit?"

The two smirks in amusement and the younger one answered with, "We're always ready."

Their employer nods and opens up his desk for the information while simultaneously replying, "Good, this next bounty has a fine payoff." Looking at the sheet, he reads aloud what is written down. "The target is Tony Idaho, a young man who's shaking up the drug trade in the Mojave. He's been able to put more dope on the market at cheaper rates than all his competitions, including the Khans, who are not too pleased."

Looking up from the paper, he speaks up with an impressed tone in his voice, "You're getting quite a reputation- the client asked for you by name. They want Tony to bite the dust, immediately. Good Luck." He finished with handing over the bounty sheet to the two. Moonlight grabs the sheet while Clayton thanks their boss.

After vacating the shack, the younger of the two looks at the bounty sheet. "…I can't read this, it is different to the ones I've seen humans write from where I live."

Clayton looks down at her with an arm reaching for the paper. "Not exactly surprising, a lot of children who are orphaned out here can't read either, they usually learn to read from whatever job they get hired to do." Moving his eyes to the bounty sheet, he begins reading to his partner.

**PROPERTY OF RANDALL & ASSOCIATES**  
Target: Tony Idaho  
Race: Hispanic  
Allegiance/Faction: Independent  
Location: Near Clark Field

Notes: Tony is the newest presence in the Mojave drug trade, and he's quickly established himself as a man who refuses to break his balls or his word – for anyone. He's almost a victim of his own success – he's put more drugs on the market at cheaper rates than anyone else, and this has perturbed the competition (the Khans, primarily). It's not just the Khans, however – Tony was benefiting from a deal with an underground supplier named Alexander, not to mention slave labor. Recently Tony and Alexander had a falling out, or as Alex said, "Tony tried to fuck me". In the midst of all this fucking, heads are going to roll, starting with Mr. Idaho. His drug den is a bunker near Clark field that keeps an armed guard 24/7. Have a plan before you try to infiltrate the place – my source says Tony keeps a suped-up carbine on his person all the time, even in his sleep. Be safe and keep your head down.

-Randall

Putting the paper away, he brings out his Readius for the map function. Moving the map to the area where Novac is, he points out the point where Clark Field is. "The end of the road here is Clark Field, so according to Steven, there is a bunker in this area." Moving his finger to the left and up a little, "This spot here is Novac, a settlement with two snipers so they might have seen people coming and going the target area. They could help shorten the area we need to search."

Stashing away the Readius, he brings his rifle to a lowered ready position. "We're going to have to restock on ammunition for me and maybe some fuel for your pistol. We can do that at Novac and get some rest before and after we go after Tony." Remembering what the area surrounding Novac is like, he expresses a concern to his partner. "Clark field is fairly irradiated, not too much that it will kill someone in a short time but it might be hazardous to you."

Moonlight looks at him and speaks up, "Would it be bad for Tony too or does this 'bunker' thing make it safe for him?"

Clayton thinks on that, "Inside will most likely be safe but the entrance definitely would not so we can shorten the area to search to spots with no radiation. Nice job thinking that."

She gave a bright smile with a small blush at the praise. With that, the two moved south on I-15. Along the way, the two ran into a couple of Jackals carrying melee weapons. With a few bullets and a ball of fire, the raiders were taken care of and bodies looted for essentials and weapons.

* * *

Arriving at Nipton a couple hours later, Clayton puts a hand on his partner's shoulder. "Stay close to me here, the folks here always put a mask up to hide their intentions which for the most part are insidious in nature." Taking his words to heart, she sticks close to him while keeping a wary eye on the townsfolk. As quickly as they entered the town, they left with no contact with the people residing there. Continuing on the road they come across various run down vehicles.

Looking closely at the wreckages, Clayton notices something out of place. Speaking in a hushed volume, "Careful, we seem to be walkin' into an ambush of some kind. Keep your eyes and ears open." The blonde girl responds to his warning without moving her line of sight. "What should I look for?"

"Landmines, see the orange cone over there by the truck trailer?" Shifting her eyes, she sees the object in question and nods. "That light tan object underneath it is an explosive that goes off when something gets within proximity of it. It has enough explosive power to blow off the legs of a regular person. I can disarm them if I get to 'em fast enough, but that might make me an easy target so you keep them occupied if someone attacks." Clayton looks over the area carefully, mentally listing off various spots for an effective ambush position.

He speaks to his partner in a whisper. "You hear anything like breathing or a gun being loaded or taken off safety?" Closing her eyes, ears twitching at the background sounds of activity behind her. She picks up the sounds of heavy breathing up in the cliffs to the left and metallic sounds clicking further up the road. Opening her eyes, she moves her hand to point out the locations of the source of the sounds.

"Atop the cliff and further down the road. The one up ahead had metallic sounds going off and the one on the cliff is breathing heavily. Those are the only things I heard in our vicinity."

Clayton looks at the spots indicated, a plan forming in his head. Whispering low, "Throw one of those fireballs of yours behind that boulder up ahead which is where one would hide when someone is coming up this way. Flush out whoever is waiting there."

Grunting in acknowledgement, she forms a ball of fire in her right hand and throws it in an arc. The ball goes up and drops down behind the boulder, igniting into a conflagration. The raider hiding behind the boulder runs out screaming from the pain of the burns. Dropping to the ground and rolling around to put out the fire. Rolling far to the side, the raider got into proximity of one of their mines which went off. Bits and pieces of the unfortunate raider flew up a dozen feet and fell back down.

Seeing the damage one 'landmine' caused, Moonlight considered watching the ground in the future to prevent such a thing from happening to her. She hears a scream from atop the cliffs. Moving her line of sight to the cliffs, she notices a female wearing a white tank top aiming a dark blue pistol at the two of them. Before the female raider pulls the trigger, her head snaps backward and the body flips back a little.

Lowering his rifle after taking the shot, Clayton looks around while talking to his companion. "That is two, keep an eye for others while I take care of the landmines." Moving forward, he reaches the landmine he spotted before the conflict started and quickly moved the cone off it and disarmed it. Picking it up and stashing it into his rucksack, he moves around the trailer, looking for other active landmines.

While he was doing this, his fox eared companion jumped atop the trailer and twitched her ears to hear anyone else. Keeping her eyes focused on her partner as he found another landmine and watched how he disarmed it. 'Move quickly, push the circle in the middle down, seems easy enough,' she thought to herself.

With the last of the landmines disarmed and collected, Clayton calls out to the young girl. "That is the last here, anyone else out here?"

"No, just some animal bleats in the cliffs behind us. Nothing else is making any sounds."

"Good, let's get going then." He starts walking and is shortly joined by his female companion. "Odd that they only have two on this spot, usually see or hear about four of them in this region."

"The Jackals we've killed so far I've seen have been in pairs so I don't see a difference here Clayton."

Shifting his eyes towards her, "These aren't the Jackals. Those in the Jackals gang prefer being in the open and attacking from angles. These two were from the Vipers gang, they specialize in ambushes. They also generally travel and ambush in larger numbers than this." Moving his line of sight back to the road ahead, he continues on. "You can generally tell which gang is which from their tactics and after awhile, their territorial reach. Basically from Primm to Nipton is Jackals territory. Vipers have the other side of Nipton to the 188 Trading Post. The Scorpions have the smallest stretch of territory since they are in conflict with another gang, they are situated near Westside. From Primm to just past Sloan is Powder Ganger lands. The Fiends have the largest stretch of territory and they are generally the most dangerous."

The two bounty hunters reach Wolfhorn Ranch. The elder of the two speaks up, "We'll take a fifteen minute break here. Just sit in the shade and drink water, no need for food right now."

Complying with his suggestion, the two sit in the shade to cool off.

"What differences are there between the various gangs," she inquires.

"Well, the Fiends and Powder Gangers are easy to spot since they have a uniform of sorts. The Fiends all have a skull of a Brahmin for headwear… and they are drugged off their asses so they are the most aggressive. The Powder Gangers are convicts and wear clothing with NCRCF on their shirts. Another difference is that the Fiends use energy based weaponry a majority of the time. Powder Gangers are experts with explosives since they have plenty of the stuff and know how to make more. The other three gangs just differ in tactics. Equipment is the same between the three." Taking a drink from his canteen, he resumes.

"The Scorpions take a more defensive tactic due to fighting with the Fiends for territory, however they are best at fighting indoors. Already told you what the other two do for tactics."

"Hmm… I see." She remains silent for a few moments. "…Can you put music on?"

Clayton, seeing no reason to deny her request, pulls his Readius out switches to the radio tab. Selecting the Mojave Music Radio station, music starts playing. Moonlight starts to lie down, enjoying the sounds of the instruments in the music.

Time passes quickly and their break ends. Turning the music off, the two start walking down the road once more. While on the road, they encountered a patrol of NCR troopers. Clayton informs them of the Viper ambush on the road further back to keep them updated of possible threats.

The rest of the trip to Novac was uneventful, other than a young male being thrown out of the Short Stick Saloon to the south of Novac. The sun was setting when they arrived at the motel office. Entering the office, they see an elderly woman behind the desk. "Ah hello there dearies, how may I help you?"

Pulling out his pouch of caps, he speaks up, "A room for the night please."

The elderly woman smiles, "That will be 100 caps please." After receiving the amount of caps, she hands over a key. "Up the stairs and first door on the left."

Muttering a 'thank you', the duo exits the office and reaches their room. Upon entering, Clayton removes his rucksack and sets it down by the couch. "We rest for the night and get the supplies and information in the morning. How's that sound to you?"

Before she can speak up, her stomach growls loudly, letting the occupants of the motel room know how hungry one of them is. With a blush on her face and hand on her stomach, she finally replies, "As long as we eat than I'm alright with that."

Giving off a small snort in amusement, he walks over to where the refrigerator is, grabbing the plate with small mounds of meat are skewered on a stick lay. Opening the fridge, he sees a bowl of soup inside. Shrugging, he grabs the bowl and takes it over with him. Handing the girl the plate, he informs her of the food. "That's bits and pieces of iguana on a stick, pretty filling despite how little it looks. Unless you want this cold bowl of soup made of squirrel."

"Nope, I'll eat the warmer of the two thank you very much."

Shrugging, Clayton brings the bowl up to his mouth and starts drinking the soup, opening his mouth further when small pieces of meat met his lips. Quickly downing the entire soup, he wipes his mouth and places the bowl on the table nearby. Without turning, sticks his arm out and receives the empty plate and puts it on top of the bowl.

Sitting on the couch, he addresses the girl. "You can sleep on the bed there, I'll take the couch. Get as much sleep as possible, no telling what will happen tomorrow." Getting up to lock the door, he lies back down on the couch and removes his boots.

Wrinkling her nose, she commented on the smell, "Your feet reek… now that I notice, you've never taken those off since we've met."

"Well, not sure if a snake or scorpion will make my boots a home over the night. So to save myself some pain and anti-venom, I keep them on when sleeping outside. Sorry 'bout the smell, it will fade in time."

Moonlight yawns and starts curling up in the bed. Clayton removes his duster and drapes it over the girl. Laying back into the couch, he puts his right arm behind his head to act as a pillow and places his left onto his rifle in case of unwanted visitors during the night.

* * *

Morning rays of sun wake the male and looking to his companion, her body almost completely covered by the duster with the exception of her tail. Sitting upright, he leans forward and shakes the girl.

Groans come from beneath the duster, red eyes shine from a small opening signifying that the girl is awake. "… I do not like sleeping on this bed."

"You are probably needed to cuddle with something to get your rest… or you're like me and sleep better on the ground." The girl sits up, the duster falling off her. Stretching, she speaks up, "Most likely that second one, I've always slept well on the cave ground back home. This thing is too soft for me."

Clayton grabs his duster from the bed and wears it. Grabbing the rest of his stuff, he walks towards the door and unlocks it. "Ready to go?" Her reply was simply getting her own equipment and meeting him at the door.

The two exit, with the male locking the door behind him. They drop off the key to Jeannie in the office and walk up to the building in the form of a large dinosaur.

"Is this building popular in your world?"

Sparing a glance at her, he walks up the stairs and replies, "If I recall correctly, buildings like this were meant to be a form of advertisement for the products being sold. It is like the billboards on the roads, they simply try to tell as many people traveling around to at least look at their products."

Opening the door and allowing the young girl to go inside first. She sees a counter with a smaller version of the dinosaur they are currently inside sitting on top of said counter. Behind the counter, leaning against the wall was the store owner, an African American with a balding hairstyle, green shirt and blue jeans. Absently she hears music going off to her left.

Clayton comes in behind her and greets the store clerk. "Hey there Cliff, we're here for supplies. What do you got for sale?"

The now named Cliff stopped leaning on the wall and moved to the chair behind the counter. Pulling out a book, he begins listing off his current inventory.

After hearing the entire inventory, which consisted mostly of the T-Rex Souvenirs, Clayton listed off what supplies he wanted to purchase. "18 rounds of 5.56, a doctor bag, a bottle of Rad-X, and I guess I'll get some coyote tobacco." Turning his head, he asks his companion, "Anything you need from that list?"

The youngest person tilts her head up to think. Shaking in the negative, Cliff speaks up.

"Altogether, the total is 116 caps." He gathers up the items while Clayton counts up the caps to hand over. Receiving a small box holding the ammo, he sets it down on the counter and places the other items inside his rucksack. Bringing up his rifle, he removes the magazine and starts putting the rounds into the magazine. Filling it up, he puts it back into position in his rifle.

"Thanks for the trade, is Manny or Boone up the stairs?"

Cliff replies while writing down his new inventory, "Manny is up there right now." Closing the book and stashing it under the counter, he puts on a friendly smile. "Do come back now."

With a nod and smile, the two partners walk upstairs to the 'sniper nest'. Opening the door and exiting onto the small area, they see someone with a rifle with a scope aimed out towards the wastes. With a red beret on his head, the one called Manny turned his head slightly to see who is up in the nest with him. Smiling at the sight of Clayton, he speaks up while turning his sights back to the wastes to the east.

"If it isn't the bounty hunter, how are you doing?"

"Hey Manny, have you or Boone seen people coming and going around Clark Field?"

Manny takes a moment to think about it, "Well, a couple days ago I saw a few guys down there, they didn't get to the ruins. There seemed to be a hatch on a small hill that I saw them opening. Also saw some Legionaries but they are dead now… feel free to piss on their bodies if you head over there."

Moonlight crinkles her nose in disgust at such a thought.

"Thanks Manny, tell your buddy Boone I said hello." Clayton opens the door to head back down. On the way back outside on ground level, the girl speaks a thought aloud. "What is his problem with those 'Legion' guys?"

"He was part of the NCR, which are the enemies to the Legion and they hold no love for one another. Just a heads up though, a lot of people in the Mojave have little to no love for the Legion. Some groups of folks are in the same opinion for the NCR."

She stops when they exit the t-rex shaped building. "Are you going to 'piss' on their bodies as that guy said?" A 'nope' is sent her way and the two continue to leave the settlement.

Crossing the bridge to the east, the two happen across the bodies of the legionaries that Manny mentioned. "Here is what the Legion look like for future reference, I can guarantee that you will see more of them later on in life. They always have a habit of showing up at the worst of times to make everything worse."

Kneeling down beside one of the bodies, he frisks the corpse for anything useful. "…Crap nothing, looks like this guy was picked clean." Moving over to the other body he finds the same applied. "Nothing on either of them." Shrugging, he stands back up, "Ah well let's get to killin' Tony."

The girl looks down at the two legionaries, giving a swift kick to the closest she catches up with the older male, not noticing the body she kicked bounce off the remains of a car.

* * *

Following the road south towards Clark Field, the two come across a large yellow lizard. Bringing his rifle up, he shoots the bipedal reptile four times in the chest region. It drops down, slowly bleeding out. Clayton grabs the lizard by the tail and drags it further back up the road. Taking his knife out, he begins skinning and cutting the meat out for food.

"This is a Golden Gecko, their hide is great at reducing damage from laser weaponry. Don't ask how, it happens and quite frankly that is all I need to know."

The blonde girl looks around, not seeing any other of the geckos in her line of sight. "Where are the others?"

Clayton looks up from his work, "More than likely, further in where the radiation is. This one here probably was a scout for threats or food for the rest." Returning to cutting apart the gecko for usable meat, he continued. "After I store this away, let us take a look around for that hatch."

She hums in agreement, taking a quick look around not seeing anything looking different from the sand and rocks. Seeing the hill to the left, she jumps up to get a higher vantage point to help locate the hatch. Upon landing on the edge of the hill, she sees a round object with a handle in the middle of a small circle of grass.

"Is this the hatch we're looking for Clayton?"

Hearing his partner's voice from the hill, he gets up and walks over to her. Seeing the hatch, he nodded. "That is a hatch, let us see if it's the one Tony is holed up in."

Grabbing a hold of the handle, he opens it up all the way and holds it up. "You want to go first or shall I?"

"You go first, you are probably better at being shot than me."

"Gee, thanks for such a compliment. I'll treasure that for the rest of my days." After displaying his 'appreciation', Clayton removes his rucksack and places it next to the hatch opening. Holding onto his rifle with his right hand, he jumps down grabbing onto the ladder with his left. After arriving on the ground, he moves over to give his partner some room when she descended.

"What in the name of fuck you doing here?"

The voice grabbed his attention. Looking to the left, he sees a guard wearing green Combat Armor and is armed with a Hunting Shotgun. The guard is standing behind a small round table holding an empty bottle with an ashtray next to it. Clayton shrugs his shoulders while bringing his rifle up to shoot and replies, "We're here to kill Tony Idaho." With that he shoots the guard in the arm, making him drop his shotgun. Biting back a yell from pain, the guard looks back up at Clayton in time to see the 5.56 bullet enter his right eye.

The body of the guard slumps over the table before hitting the ground. After the short time of excitement ends, Moonlight lands next to the ladder. "What did I miss?"

"Not much, a guard that sucked at his job dying." Moving to said guard's body, he began rifling through the pockets. Finding some 12 gauge shells and a bottle of whiskey, he begins removing the armor.

The female quirks her eyebrow, "What are you doing?"

"Combat armor such as this sells for a lot of caps, more than what we have made from our previous bounty." After completely removing it, he places it next to the ladder. "We'll take it back up after we get Tony." The girl looks around, noticing how empty the room is save for the dead guard, the table with the contents on it, and a green rectangular box underneath the table. Facing the stairs leading further down, her ears start twitching at the sound of small explosions going off. Clayton heard the resulting echoes and readied his rifle while moving onward as silent as possible.

Creeping down the hallway, the first room he comes across is on the right. Taking a quick glance, he sees down the hall a bed that looked to be in very good condition, a red rug as well as an old television set. Not seeing anything else from his angle, he motioned to his partner to approach and listen for anything.

Silently bounding up to him, she gets between her partner and the wall. Sticking one of her ears out to the room, she concentrates on hearing anything. She picks up the sounds of glass being set down rather angrily and something resembling a gust of air passing through a tube. A small roar of human rage bursts out from the room and both of them get ready for a fight.

They get a brief glimpse of a male in a striped white suit before he opened fire on them. Taking cover behind the wall as the bullets peppered the wall in the hallway. Clayton notices the size the dents in the wall behind him and pays attention to the rate of fire. "This is definitely our guy." Grunting as a bullet ricocheted off the wall into his thigh. "Fuck that hurts. He'll run out of ammo soon, which is when we'll get him."

Sure enough, they hear the ending of bullets being fire and cursing starting. Turning the corner and taking aim at the hostile, fires at center mass. Taking five rounds to the chest, the man in the suit yells out in defiance and tries to shoot with an empty rifle. Clayton fires two more rounds into the man's chest, one piercing his heart, and he finally falls. Keeping his sights on the body in case it was just an act, he moves forward with a slight limp due to the 5mm round in his leg. Moving closer to the supposed corpse, he aims at the head and fires a round into it to ensure a kill.

"Clear, come on up little lady." He waits a few moment, turns around when his partner is taking awhile to catch up. He notices her holding her left shoulder with a pained expression on her face.

Moving as fast as he could to her, he took her hand off her shoulder, lifted the poncho and looked at her wound. "…Well, you won't die from that but like the one on got in my leg, it will hurt like hell till we take care of it. Go over to the bed, make yourself comfortable." Looking around for anything that can be used for medical purposes, he sees the small bar in the corner of the room. Moving slowly behind the bar counter, he sees a large stock of whiskey on one of the shelves.

Grabbing one of the bottles of whiskey, he hobbles over to the bed. "Take the poncho off, I'm going to disinfect the wound with this," shaking the bottle, he takes the cap off the bottle while his partner removes the poncho. "This will sting a little, so prepare for the pain."

"Being shot in the shoulder hurts, I doubt this will compare to that," she retorted.

Smirking knowingly, he tilts her body back a bit and pours the contents into the wound. She immediately felt a burning sensation different from fire spread into the wound. Biting back a scream, she starts taking shorter breaths, eventually slowing down to her normal breathing pattern. "Feel better?"

She sends him a scathing look while sarcastically answering, "I feel like I was never shot, thanks for asking." Rolling his eyes at her sarcasm, he speaks back up, "Well prepare for it to hurt again, the bullet didn't exit out of you so I have to dig into the bullet wound and remove the bullet." Grabbing his knife, he pours the whiskey on the blade and puts the tip next to the wound and looks back at her. "Need something to bite down on or are you going to be fine?"

"Just get the whole thing over with."

Clayton pushes the knife in slowly following the bullet path. He feels the metal in her wound, pushing the knife up slightly and starts pushing the bullet out with the tip. The girl's face twitches in pain every few seconds until the bullet is removed from her body.

"Pour some whiskey into the wound again while I make some bandages here for you." Being used to the pain by now, she pours a little of the brown colored liquid into her wound with a stiff expression on her face. She hears ripping sounds behind her and notices her partner tearing apart the cloth covering the pillow. Using the knife, the cloth is cut into ribbons. Taking half of the ribbons made he moves back to her.

Pouring what was left of the whiskey onto the improvised bandages, he starts wrapping her wound up while applying as much pressure as he could to stem the bleeding. Finishing, he looks at her, "You're good to go now, can you grab another bottle behind the counter, and I'll get started on my wound."

Both began their recent jobs, one collecting alcohol the other digging into his leg for the bullet. She returns to the bed as he finished removing the bullet from his thigh. He lies down on the bed and reaches up to grab the other bandages. Moonlight takes the cap off the bottle and hands it to her partner. Soaking the bandages, he starts to wrap his leg as tightly as he could.

"That should do it." Standing back up, he moves over to the corpse of the freshly red and white suit. Putting his knife to the finger, he applies pressure and cuts it off. "Grab whatever you can here and place it back at the entrance. I'll take a look around for other threats or stuff to sell." Nodding, she grabbed what she could and started her way back to the entrance.

Clayton went further into the bunker, taking his left when he got back into the hallway and found the chem plant. A couple desks, several wooden crates, tables with chem stations and various ingredients to make the addictive drugs. He notices the bodies of the workers, heads destroyed beyond recognition and metallic collars on their necks. 'Check back here in a bit.'

Going back to the hallway, he continues on down to the end and enters the room that appears to house the workers. The stained mattresses line the walls with broken shelves in the back holding onto empty cans and dishes. One thing did stick out and he grabbed a small box that made metallic clinging sounds when shaken. Opening it up, he found the box contained various tools and a small amount of parts to repair weapons. Judging by the parts in the box, it would only repair shotguns and rifles. Closing the box up, he carries it underneath his arm after slinging his rifle onto his back.

He moves back to the entrance and drops off the repair kit. Heading back to the chem making room, he starts opening the crates, finding various drugs inside. Moving to a wall in the back, he finds a small wooden box and grabs it. Placing the drugs into the small box, he takes it back to the entrance. He finds various items now accompanying the Combat Armor and repair kit.

Sixteen and half bottles of whiskey, empty jet containers, an assault carbine, two bottles of Nuka-Cola, and a book titled 'The Wasteland Survival Guide'. Hearing his partner coming up behind him, he asks, "This everything?" She hands him two sheets of paper, "Found these on Tony's body, I kicked him for some vengeance, he definitely deserved it."

Grabbing the papers, he read the top aloud, "Tony, I'll keep supplying the materials as long as you supply the caps. And another thing- don't fuck me, Tony. Don't you ever try to fuck me. –Alexander"

"That Alexander guy sounds pleasant," she dryly commented.

Moving to the other page he begins to read.

"Mr. Idaho, I'd like to personally thank you for your recent purchase. We stand by our pledge to provide you reliable, economic tools to ensure stability and control in your place of business. A new feature of the SS-250 model is its nifty fail-deadly protocol; should any calamity befall you, all your property would justly perish as well. This is the latest and most effective measure against the violent impulses of human property. Please contact us if the product is defective or unsatisfactory in any way. Sincerely, E. Jones President, Servitude Solutions, Inc."

Exhaling tiredly at the realization of the deaths of the two workers, he removes his and scratches his scalp. "Those explosive sounds we heard was the workers being killed by slave collars. They were set to go off when Tony dies, judging by these empty jet containers," pointing at said containers, "he apparently would have died overdosing on them eventually… go kick his body again if you wouldn't mind."

She flashed a bright smile at him for letting her kick the one that shot them. Moving down the stairs to do just that, Clayton climbed back up the ladder and opened the hatch, grabbing one of the items they collected, he climbed up and set it down next to the rucksacks. Looking down into the hatch, he sees his companion again.

"Can you hand up the rest of the loot?"

She looks up, "Sure." Reaching down into the stash pile, she starts grabbing the items and hands it up to Clayton. After handing off the last of the items, she climbed up.

She saw him placing the last of the items, which was the black box containing repair tools, into his rucksack. Putting their rucksacks onto their backs, they set back to Novac.

* * *

After arriving, they head to the dino-store. Selling a majority of the stuff they took from the bunker, they made a very large profit. They held onto two bottles of whiskey, the repair tool kit, Tony's rifle, the notes, and the wasteland survival book. Looking at the time on his Readius, Clayton speaks up.

"If we head out now, we can make it to the farmhouse we rested at before it gets too dark. Move out in the morning and turn in Tony's finger."

"Shouldn't we go to a healer of some sort for these wounds?"

"I know the doctor here doesn't have many supplies that are sterile to help much, better that she uses them for the people here."

"…You're too nice to people you know?"

Clayton releases a small sigh. "Yeah, but I'm only nice to people in settlements other than Freeside. I tend to believe everyone else in the wasteland is hostile to some extent. Paranoia has kept me and others who do the same alive for a good while."

His partner huffs, "You humans here are so much worse than the ones I've killed if you and others are paranoid to staying alive."

He looks at her with an eyebrow raised, "You haven't seen the worst of our humanity just yet. Eventually you will, then you can say whatever you want about us and folks will more likely agree with you." Rubbing the wound on his leg a bit to get rid of the itch that formed, "Let's get going."

* * *

Walking south, they eventually pass by the ranger station to see a patrol of NCR Troopers heading east through the cliffs. After arriving at the run down ranch, the two enter the farmhouse, seeing only one bed and various other forms of furniture.

"Bed or star filled sky?"

Moonlight takes a few moments to think over her answer. Looking up at her companion, she replied, "Outside, no offense but this place is too small for me, makes me feel oddly uncomfortable."

He looks at her slightly with surprise, "You're claustrophobic?"

"What does that mean?"

"Basically, claustrophobia is either a fear of cramped spaces or feeling uncomfortable in small spaces. Quite honestly, I'm wondering why you have that when you've lived in a cave."

Huffing in indignation, "The cave had large areas, no small parts like this place."

Rolling his eyes, he opens the door and lets her walk outside. Walking to the left, they set their bags down next to the machinery, moved the toolboxes and scraps of metal. Removing his duster, he sits down in the corner up against the farmhouse with his partner sitting in between his legs to snuggle up with him. Covering the both of them with the duster, his rifle leaned up against the shack wall next to him.

"Enjoy the night little lady, I'll stay up for a bit to make take in the starry sky." Looking up in to the square shaped hole in the ceiling of the shack, he feels the fox girl slight shifting. "Until I actually get tired I'll watch the stars too."

The two watch as the sky darkens and star upon star began appearing. Minutes pass by, turning into hours, eventually the female of the two drifted off to sleep. The red haired male took a quick look down at her, shifting a bit, he takes his .45 pistol out and keeps it in his hand. Staying up for another hour, he too succumbs to sleep.

Morning comes and Clayton wakes up due to his own internal clock. Taking a quick glance around, he notes nothing out of place and no new additions. Waiting for his smaller companion to wake up from her own slumber, he moves his body slightly to holster his pistol. Half an hour passes and she begins to stir, he pats her shoulder to get her to stand up.

Doing their morning rituals or lack thereof, they set out on the road once more. Nearing Nipton, Moonlight sticks with Clayton, even if there are not that many people out. Passing through without incident, the two get back onto I-15 and travel towards Randall's shack.

Near the shack, they stop at the remains of a drive-in. "What are we doing here Clayton?"

Clayton, instead of answering, moves towards one of the destroyed vehicles, he jimmies the hood of the car open revealing some weapons, a form of armor with a helmet with red lenses, and two ammo crates. Removing the rifle that Tony had on him (and shot them with), he places it inside the remains of the car and closes the hood. Without turning to face his companion, he answers her earlier question.

"I store weapons that have had some modification done to them here in case I need them for a certain situation. My old armor is here too." Turning to face her, "It helps to have some hiding places, for emergencies." He begins heading up the hill with the girl following shortly.

Arriving before noon, they enter the small building to see that their boss is yet again on the typewriter, tapping away on the keys. Clayton clears his throat to gain his attention.

Looking up, Randall opens up with, "Is Tony dead yet?"

Clayton takes out the finger that more than likely shot them, "Yes."

Reaching over everything on his desk, Randall takes the finger from his counterpart. "Outstanding work. Take a break," looking at Moonlight, "you too kid. You've both earned it!"

Stashing the finger in the usual place, Randall grabs a bag of caps and hands it over to the two. Clayton looks inside the bag and sees the amount he and his partner received. Nodding towards his boss, he and the smaller female left the shack.

"We got 500 caps for that one," taking out half of the caps and storing it away in another pouch, he hands the other half to her. "I'd suggest we take that break, allow our wounds to heal a little more before we take another bounty."

She just shrugs her shoulders, wincing a little from her own wound. "Anything we can do during this break?"

Clayton looks up, "…I guess I can teach ya how to read, that survival guide will help with that. Other than that I got nothing but killing time waiting."

She looks at him, "Should I be concerned of learning how to read?" Her partner gives her a small smile. "If you want me to teach you in a way that you will be concerned then sure, otherwise I'll be patient. You won't learn the writing system within a day." He starts moving towards the campsite they often stay at.

Arriving at the playground, he just sits down in the usual spot and pulls out the survival guide. He looks at her, "So let us get started on this."

* * *

 **That is the end of that chapter. Life has interrupted me several times, mostly dealing with family visits. I'll take a small break myself to attempt to draw what the two look like. If I can't get it detailed that well I'll just use the Fallout boy and girl models to simplify it.**

 **On a side note, I will be looking for someone who would like to offer their 'Courier' to make an appearance further in. For those who have played New Vegas Bounties, the encounter will be after the last 'bounty' so there is still plenty of time. Those who do offer, just have to submit the general description, basically eye, hair color, hair styles, apparel and weapons they will carry, and their general personality.**

 **Personally, I would hope for StaffSergeant's 'Courier' Marcus Wardes, I do love his interpretation of how the wasteland will affect the one shot in the head and buried alive. The other I would hope to have submitted would be Laluzi's 'Courier' Cain, mainly because it is the only Female courier that I've read that is very well done. However, we don't get what we want all the time so I'll pick which ever I think is best from those who volunteer, I'll converse with the winner on how to write the dialogue for the future encounter.**


	4. Bounty Tommy

Chapter 4

Bounty Tommy

Several days pass by and little has happened. The youngest of the bounty hunting pair practices reading while both of them heal from their bullet wounds. After enough time has passed and their wounds are more of a phantom feeling, they decide to get back to their 'jobs'.

Walking back to the shack without a visible limp, the two walk inside and see their boss once again typing away on the typewriter. Moonlight just stares blankly at the scene that is becoming a common occurrence in this 'profession' while Clayton walks up to the desk.

Steven looks up, not even bothering to stop typing. "I've got another bounty lined up if you're ready."

"The both of us are ready," Clayton replies.

"Alright, your target is Tommy, a hotheaded wiseguy associated with the Omertas." Digging into his desk, Steven grabs a sheet of paper and continues on. "Tommy was always quick to throw down, but the other night he got worked up after some guy cracked a joke about his shoes. Can you imagine?"

Shaking his head at the stupidity of such a thing, Steven resumes the summary. "Anyway, Tommy whipped out his pistol and capped this fella, right there outside the casino. As it turns out, this guy was sort of… connected, so to speak. In short, Tommy fucked up, and now he's gotta pay."

Steven leans back into his chair, "My contact says that Tommy is probably hiding out at the old Tumbleweed Ranch. They say he's jumpy as shit and prone to shoot anything that comes through the door, so be careful." Reaching over his desk he hands the pair the bounty sheet. "Good luck you two."

After receiving the paper and nodding in appreciation the wish of good luck, the two exit the shack. Pulling out the Readius, Clayton moves the map around to show the route to the supposed location of their quarry.

Moonlight grabs the bounty sheet and tries to read it out loud.

" _Property of Randall and Associates. Target is Tommy. Race is Caw… Caw…_ -Caucasian little lady- _Right that. Allegiance or Faction is Omertas, who are they?_ "

"The Omertas are a tribe of folks that own one of the bigger casinos in the New Vegas Strip. They double as a brothel and drug den, sadly one of the more popular casinos because of that."

"Huh… continuing on. Location is supposedly Tumbleweed Ranch. The notes say Tommy worked as muscle for them for years until he killed an associate with witnesses around. The Omertas want him handled by someone outside their group and sent the request of sorts to us. Says Tommy is always on Jet and Psycho and the advice we got is to go in guns blazing."

Handing the sheet over to Clayton, he sticks it into his rucksack and readies himself for the journey. "Good job with the reading little lady, you definitely improved quite a bit."

Moonlight smiles at the praise while he continues. "We'll be traveling north on I-25, keep an eye out for powder gangers and fiends. The trip will take awhile so we will have to take a few breaks and rest up at Westside."

Nodding in acceptance of the plan, she ensures that her rucksack is on her and starts walking to the road they frequent with Clayton a short distance behind.

* * *

Arriving at Sloan, they take their first break, drinking down their canteens and filling them up with the bottle water. They rest for a quarter of an hour listening to the radio. Packing back up and leaving, the two continue north. They come across a couple of powder gangers and after looting their bodies of anything useful march on.

The two start to near Westside when the sun starts to set. Moonlight stops and takes a few sniffs of the air. "I smell blood," taking a few more whiffs, "Over there," points to the northwest.

Following where her finger… paw is pointing and grimaces a little at what the general direction holds. "Well, whoever the blood is coming from probably pissed off the Scorpion gang or the Fiends." Letting out a sigh, "Let's go see what we can scavenge then."

Moving towards the apartment building, the two come upon the source of the bloody smell. Resting next to a dumpster was the body of male wearing a bounty hunter duster. Surrounding him was the bodies of six Fiends and next to him was a tan and black dog. Within the corpse's hands was a note with some blood on it.

The dog looks up to them and whimpers to the two of them. Moving to the body and grabbing the note, Clayton reads it out.

" _Don't know why I want to write. Bleeding out, can't get to Westside. Fiends keep coming, but I've managed to fend them off. It won't matter much longer, though. At least Guts_ " the dog perks up at the mention of that last word, " _is still with me. My good friend, the only one who's been with me to the end. Better than my ex-wife, that's for damn sure. At least dogs won't fuck the neighbor and then steal everything you own. I guess it's fitting that he's here with me. Feeling woozy, always thought I'd be cold at the end. If you read this, and Guts is still here, please take care of my friend. I would like…_ just trails off there."

Lowering the letter to look at the dog, he gives off a sad smile. "Little lady, go through the bodies and grab what you can, leave this one alone though. The dog will come with us." Seeing no real reason to be against that, she goes through with her instructions.

Clayton kneels to the dog, "Hey there boy, I apologize you lost your buddy. He said to take care of ya if someone read his letter, so how about you come with me and the little lady." Guts, the dog sniffs him and licks him, giving the acceptance of the invitation. Smiling, Clayton stands back up and turns to help Moonlight with the looting.

After compiling all that was good to sell, the three begin heading to Westside to offload the loot. The night sky full of stars and the moon shedding the light that guided their path while pleasant to look at, did not improve their disposition.

Entering the settlement through a gated door, Moonlight looks behind her for a brief moment and asks Clayton, "What was that 'Thorn' place?"

Continuing on towards the pawn shop, he answers her. "The Thorn is an underground fightin' ring. Usually for animal on animal violence, folks bet on a side and winners get a good amount of caps. People can go in and fight the animals and they get a very large portion of the pot that was collected from the bets."

Humming at the response, "Sounds fun. Shall we go and look at some of the fights on our way back?"

"Sure, it will help get you used to seeing the various creatures of the Mojave. Just a word of warning, do not aid or hinder a side that is fighting or you will be shot."

The trio arrives at the pawn shop and enters it. Shelves with various items greet their eyes. Shifting his eyes around the shop, Clayton finds the owner and walks towards him while getting his attention.

"Excuse me, we're here to trade for supplies."

Looking back towards his customers, the owner greets them. "Ah hello there, the name is Miguel. What are you looking to trade?"

Removing their rucksacks, they begin to pull out all the weapons and other valuable items they 'freed' from the Fiends. Miguel lists them off as this is being done.

"Two revolvers, a laser pistol, a switchblade, a 9mm pistol, and a pool cue. They don't really equal up to much in the condition they are. Roughly 120 caps for all that, so what are you looking to buy?"

Looking around a bit, something sticks out enough to peak his interest. He grabs it and replies to the pawn shop owner, "I'll take this and some ammo, 5.56 rounds if you have them."

Taking the item and moving towards the counter, Miguel grabs a box containing the requested ammo. "Only got 12 rounds, so the total comes out to 98 caps. Let me grab 22 caps for the whole transaction."

Receiving the items and stashing them away into his rucksack the trio leave the store. "What was it that you grabbed," Moonlight asked.

"Just a crowbar… surprised that no one else went for it though. It will help us get into places if they are boarded up while not burning them down. Can also block off a door for awhile, stalling whoever or whatever is trying to get through."

Shrugging at the response, the three head a short way west towards the apartment building. Looking down the street, Moonlight spots something odd.

"What is that thing over there?"

Looking in the same direction, Clayton answers her, "Ah that's Mean Sonofabitch. That is his actual name and not an insult. He is pretty much the protector of Westside, kind of odd since he is extremely nice. He is what everyone calls a Super Mutant."

"Wait, that is what my strength is based off of?"

"Yup, well come on little lady let's get some sleep." Clayton said pointing towards the apartment building.

Upon renting a room to sleep for the night, the two and their dog companion enter the room and proceed to lock it. Looking at the bed and the floor, Clayton brings up the important question for the night.

"Bed or floor?"

The fox girl switches her gaze between the two a couple of times then looks at him. "Floor will be more comfortable to me."

Shrugging and removes his duster and rucksack he lays down next to the bed. The blonde lies next to him while Guts the dog does to the same. Using the duster as a blanket once again, the group of three begins to sleep.

* * *

The morning comes in quietly as the sun peaks through the cracked windows. They get up and prepare their breakfast, cooking up the gecko meat in their rucksack and offering one to their newest partner. The group set out to their destination to claim the most recent bounty.

A few hours of walking and the three arrive at Tumbleweed Ranch. "The place seems abandoned," the girl pointed out. "Meh, it is places like this that folks like to hide out at, far out of place and almost nothing nearby."

Readying his rifle, the three stealthily walk up to the door. Turning to Guts, "Stay here boy, keep guard to make sure no one but us comes out." Guts barks in acknowledgement. Shifting his gaze to his partner, he nods his head towards the door.

Understanding what he wants, she grabs the handle to the door and waits for his mark to open it. Counting down from 3, the door opens and a rifle is shown through the opening. Entering the large shack as quiet as possible, the two stop for a moment in the large room.

Looking towards the fox girl, she closes her eyes and begins to try and hear out their target. Hearing something towards the back, she points in that very direction. The two begin moving towards the back room.

Their target comes out of the room and attempts to draw his pistol when he notices them. Three rounds from the 5.56 carbine put a stop to that. Without looking at her, Clayton taps his ears as a way to ask if she hears anything else. Repeating her earlier action, she doesn't hear anything else inside the shack. She says as much.

Placing his rifle onto his back, Clayton begins sifting through the corpse's pockets. His striped white suit makes it quite easy to determine if there is anything of note. Finding a small stash of Psycho and Jet in his pants pockets, his 9mm pistol tucked into the backside of his pants. A note is tucked away in his suit pocket. Grabbing it, Clayton reads it out to his partner.

" _Tommy,_

 _I understand you recently left the Omerta organization under less than favorable circumstances. In the Mojave, to find yourself alone often implies extreme peril._

 _With that in mind, I'm willing to make you an offer. My firm specializes in contracts of a very risky, specific nature – assassination. We are always cultivating new talent, and at first glance you definitely possess the acumen for our business. I am willing to offer you a position, under one condition._

 _Soon you will be visited by a contractor from my rival, Randall & Associates. Killing your assailant would be conducive to your health and beneficial to my business interests. If you bring me the head of Clayton, consider yourself hired._

 _It would be wise to accinge yourself for the imminent confrontation – the aforementioned individual, while new to the profession, is apparently precocious and quite capable._

 _Sincerely,_

 _The Judge_ "

Clayton continues to stare at the letter, focusing on the latter part of the apparent warning. "Well shit, now our targets are essentially being tested to kill me. At least they did not mention you little lady."

"Yes cause the mentioning of you getting killed to get hired by some guy named 'The Judge' is such a wonderful thing." She looks at the chems that was on Tommy's person. "What exactly do those do if someone takes them?"

Glancing at the psycho and jet, "Psycho essentially increases someone's aggression, effectively making them similar to a berserker while Jet increases one's perception of time. Basically makes whoever takes Jet see everything move in slow motion. I would not suggest taking any chem as they are very addictive. They do happen to sell for a pretty cap though."

Clayton kneels down while pulling out 'The Emasculator' and cuts off Tommy's finger and places it into a bag. Standing back up and readies his rifle, the two exits the building.

"Come on boy, our job here is done." Guts barks happily and the three trot down south.

* * *

The three reach Westside and begin climbing down the ladder to the Thorn. After having to carry their canine addition, they reach a large room with spotlights illuminating the arena on the lower floors. Occupying the arena were a large scorpion and three geckos.

After finding a decent spot to sit and watch the carnage, Clayton informs the young girl of what the competitors are.

"You already know of the geckos, since we've killed plenty of them while that is the Radscorpion down there killing them. As you can see, the geckos will not win this fight."

Not long after the Radscorpion defeats its opponents and vacates the arena floor, a voice is heard across the room. "The upcoming fight will be between a Deathclaw in the red corner versus a brave (but stupid) soul who challenged it in the blue corner!"

Clayton snorts in amusement, "Whoever decided to fight a Deathclaw better be quick with strong firepower or they will not last long."

A few minutes pass and the 'contestants' arrive behind the barred gates. The fox girl sees the human challenger over where there is a blue light, and then switches her gaze over to the red light's origin. A large bipedal lizard with a slouched posture is seen. Protruding horns on the top of its skull, tan hide that bulges with muscle and a tail with small spikes at the end. The most frightening aspects seen however were the claws that extended a good distance and its face. The claws looked very slim, able to cut through anything they are swung against. The face shows blank white eyes, as if the creature is staring into one's soul. Its teeth looked as if they can chew through metal and bone just as easily as meat.

A countdown begins and when it ended, both gates opened allowing the inhabitants to come out. The deathclaw charges forward with its arms spread wide open to catch the prey it smelled. The poor human kept shooting center mass with a low caliber rifle, hardly causing enough damage to puncture the thick hide of the beast.

The lizard grabs the foolish person and slams him down to the ground. Using its free hand to stab forward into the body of its captured prey, it impales the soon to be corpse and simply swipes to the side. Blood and internal organs are splattered across the arena floor and walls. People cheer at the violence while the victor enjoys its newly acquired meal.

Turning to face her older companion, "That was over quick."

A chuckle is barely heard over the crowd, "It happens like that for everyone not prepared to kill a deathclaw. First mistake the idiot made was trying to kill one with that weak ass rifle of his. Second would be that he shot at the chest, better to shoot the legs at or around the knee joint to make sure it cannot get to you. After that aim for the face, so much easier to immobilize it so can't use your flesh as a chew toy."

Watching the deathclaw walk back into the gated area from which it came with the remains of its meal Clayton speaks back up.

"So, you want to watch another or shall we leave?"

She takes her eyes off the red haired male and looks towards the arena floor then back at him. "Let us go ahead and leave. I get the feeling I would stay here far too long for your tastes just to watch humans get mutilated like that."

Shrugging his shoulders at that, partially because it was correct, the three head back to the ladder. Again, Guts needed to carried while they exit the sewers and begin their trek back south.

* * *

The sun peaks then sets during their trip back to their boss with very little happening. The trio stops at Sloan and rests up for the night.

Continuing on in the morning, the three arrive back at Randall & Associates with the sun almost at its peak. Entering the shack and approaching their boss, Steven notices them and begins the inquiry.

"Did you kill Tommy or what?"

The two nod with the younger speaking up, "Yes we did." Clayton hands over the finger.

"Terrific work you two." Guts barks out for recognition. "Three now I guess. Anyhow here's a bonus." Reaching into his desk, he pulls out the small bag of caps and hands it to Clayton. "Come back when you're ready for more work," and goes right back to his typing.

The three exit the shack and head back over to the playground that is essentially their 'home'. Heating up more gecko meat for lunch, Clayton pulls out 'The Wasteland Survival Guide' and sits down against the rocky wall. Finishing up her meal, Moonlight walks over and sits with him to begin the reading lesson. Guts is content with just lying in the sun with a bowl of water nearby.

The two enjoy the down time while their newest companion is basking in the sunlight. Music and the news come from the radio highlighting more raider attacks and the constant NCR skirmishes with Legion forces.

The day passes by quickly, the sun sets while the fire burning for their dinner shines brightly. After downing the last of her gecko steak, the blonde of the two speaks up.

"This lifestyle is becoming somewhat comfortable to me. I still prefer to be back at my cave."

"Heh, well don't get too comfortable. I can guarantee that a shit storm will happen when you do and it makes a large mess of everything. It happens all the time. Just look at Guts, his previous partner died."

She looks at him blankly, "Don't say stuff like that, makes it sound like you will die soon. You are the only human that I actually like. Steven is getting up there too but you are the only one actively helping me."

"Good to know, but don't start falling in love with me now. I'm old enough to be your dad, so it would be a little creepy if ya do."

She scoffs, "Please, if anything you are… what is the word for a brother to a parent?"

"Uncle."

"Yeah, you're an uncle if that was the case. Not sure if there are problems with seeing you as one but I already had a father."

Shrugging his shoulders, "Way to make me feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside little lady. I honestly enjoy being an uncle, I'd make an awful parent with how I'm living. Especially since my life expectancy is fairly short so any kid I end up raising will likely be an orphan before they become a decade old."

"With how you're teaching me, I doubt that will be a problem. If you do end up raising a kid though, I reserve the right to cause bodily harm if they annoy me enough."

With a small chortle of laughter, Clayton pats her on the shoulder. "Only if you give me to same if you get a kid."

"Deal."

* * *

 **Sorry about the extremely late update. I enrolled into a school near the beginning of the year and before that was all the good game releases that occupied my time. Lately been searching for a job so that will take up time as well as school work. I will try to write bit by bit of the future chapters when I can.**

 **On a brighter note, I did end up drawing Moonlight Flower with her clothes. The downside is that I could not do the same for Clayton as I did not have a still picture of him… until recently anyways. Now I just need a working scanner to put the drawing up and find a place on the web to upload it to. A side note, I apparently still suck at drawing proportionally.**

 **If yall feel like it, review the story. Tell me how I am doing, the good and bad.**


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